ThoughtGallery.org > Motherhood: Rachel Zucker, Jennifer Chang, Keetje Kuipers, Airea D. Matthews, Deborah Paredez, and Monica Ferrell

Motherhood: Rachel Zucker, Jennifer Chang, Keetje Kuipers, Airea D. Matthews, Deborah Paredez, and Monica Ferrell

On Mother’s Day Eve parent-poets will take back a holiday that so many dread by reading poems of motherhood and childrearing that turn the notion of ‘mommy dearest’ on its pretty little apron-wearing head. Rachel Zucker, Jennifer Chang, Keetje Kuipers, Airea D. Matthews, Deborah Paredez, and Monica Ferrell will help us celebrate a night of mommy poetry without borders or boundaries. In the spirit of supporting all the mamas among us, this event will also be an informal fundraiser for Safe Horizon, an NYC non-profit serving victims of domestic violence and abuse. Please bring a little cash and help us to honor them when we pass the hat.

Jennifer Chang is the author of The History of Anonymity and Some Say the Lark, which was long-listed for the PEN Open Book Award and won the 2018 William Carlos Williams Award. Her poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, The Nation, The New York Times, The New Yorker, Poetry, and A Public Space, and her essays have appeared in Los Angeles Review of Books, New England Review, New Literary History and The Volta. She co-chairs the advisory board of Kundiman and teaches at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

Monica Ferrell is the author of three books, most recently the poetry collection You Darling Thing (Four Way, September 2018), named a New & Noteworthy selection by The New York Times and a finalist for the Believer Book Award in Poetry. She directs the Creative Writing Program at Purchase College (SUNY) and lives with her husband and two children in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn.

Keetje Kuipers’ third collection, All Its Charms, was published in 2019. Her poems have appeared in over 100 magazines, as well as the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. Previously a Wallace Stegner fellow, Bread Loaf fellow, and the Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Resident, Kuipers is currently Senior Editor at Poetry Northwest.

Airea D. Matthews is the author of the poetry collection, Simulacra, and recipient of the 2016 Yale Series of Younger Poets Award, which has received praise from outlets including The New Yorker and The Washington Post. Her work has appeared in The Rumpus, Best American Poets 2015, American Poet, and elsewhere. She received the 2016 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award and was awarded the Louis Untermeyer Scholarship in 2016 from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. Ms. Matthews is working on her second poetry collection, under/class, which explores poverty. She is an assistant professor at Bryn Mawr College.

Deborah Paredez is the author of the critical study, Selenidad: Selena, Latinos, and the Performance of Memory (2009) and of the poetry volumes, This Side of Skin (2002) and Year of the Dog, forthcoming from BOA Editions in 2020. She is a professor of creative writing and ethnic studies at Columbia University and the Co-Founder and Co-Director of CantoMundo, a national organization for Latinx poets.











When: Sat., May. 11, 2019 at 7:00 pm
Where: McNally Jackson
52 Prince St.
212-274-1160
Price: Free, donations welcome
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On Mother’s Day Eve parent-poets will take back a holiday that so many dread by reading poems of motherhood and childrearing that turn the notion of ‘mommy dearest’ on its pretty little apron-wearing head. Rachel Zucker, Jennifer Chang, Keetje Kuipers, Airea D. Matthews, Deborah Paredez, and Monica Ferrell will help us celebrate a night of mommy poetry without borders or boundaries. In the spirit of supporting all the mamas among us, this event will also be an informal fundraiser for Safe Horizon, an NYC non-profit serving victims of domestic violence and abuse. Please bring a little cash and help us to honor them when we pass the hat.

Jennifer Chang is the author of The History of Anonymity and Some Say the Lark, which was long-listed for the PEN Open Book Award and won the 2018 William Carlos Williams Award. Her poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, The Nation, The New York Times, The New Yorker, Poetry, and A Public Space, and her essays have appeared in Los Angeles Review of Books, New England Review, New Literary History and The Volta. She co-chairs the advisory board of Kundiman and teaches at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

Monica Ferrell is the author of three books, most recently the poetry collection You Darling Thing (Four Way, September 2018), named a New & Noteworthy selection by The New York Times and a finalist for the Believer Book Award in Poetry. She directs the Creative Writing Program at Purchase College (SUNY) and lives with her husband and two children in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn.

Keetje Kuipers’ third collection, All Its Charms, was published in 2019. Her poems have appeared in over 100 magazines, as well as the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. Previously a Wallace Stegner fellow, Bread Loaf fellow, and the Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Resident, Kuipers is currently Senior Editor at Poetry Northwest.

Airea D. Matthews is the author of the poetry collection, Simulacra, and recipient of the 2016 Yale Series of Younger Poets Award, which has received praise from outlets including The New Yorker and The Washington Post. Her work has appeared in The Rumpus, Best American Poets 2015, American Poet, and elsewhere. She received the 2016 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award and was awarded the Louis Untermeyer Scholarship in 2016 from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. Ms. Matthews is working on her second poetry collection, under/class, which explores poverty. She is an assistant professor at Bryn Mawr College.

Deborah Paredez is the author of the critical study, Selenidad: Selena, Latinos, and the Performance of Memory (2009) and of the poetry volumes, This Side of Skin (2002) and Year of the Dog, forthcoming from BOA Editions in 2020. She is a professor of creative writing and ethnic studies at Columbia University and the Co-Founder and Co-Director of CantoMundo, a national organization for Latinx poets.

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