Poetry Reading: Curtis L. Crisler, Bree Jo'ann Flannelly, & Liz Whiteacre

Join Curtis L. Crisler, Bree Jo'ann Flannelly, & Liz Whiteacre at Indy Reads on October 6th from 2-4pm for a celebration of poetry!

These three poets will collaborate, creating an atmosphere of artistic excitement, all three sharing the mic, and taking turns reading a poem inspired by the last. The poets feed off each other, not knowing what to read until that very moment. Poets will be given a 10-minute solo set to share their work. There will be a discussion to follow.

Meet the Poets

Curtis L. Crisler

Curtis L. Crisler was born and raised in Gary, Indiana. Crisler, an award-winning poet/author, has a new book called Doing Drive-bys on How to Love in the Midwest. He has six poetry books, two YA books, and five poetry chapbooks. He’s been published in a variety of magazines, journals, and anthologies. He’s co-editor of poetry for the Museum of Americana. He created the Indiana Chitlin Circuit and the poetry form called the sonastic. He’s the Indiana Poet Laureate and Professor of English at Purdue University Fort Wayne (PFW). He can be contacted at www.poetcrisler.com.

Curtis L. Crisler’s Doing Drive-bys on How to Find Love in the Midwest

Curtis L. Crisler’s Doing Drive-bys on How to Find Love in the Midwest is a

lyrical poetic topography embodying his “urban Midwestern sensibility” (uMs).

Through his uMs lens, his poems transfigure and chronicle the humanity of the

past, present, and future of Black Midwesterners (and all globe-stompers)—

transforming our dead and living into one sacrosanct body that traverses this

earth with our surreal and haggard breaths.

Praise for Doing Drive-bys on How to Love in the Midwest

“…Whitman affected me this way, and Dickinson did, and so did T.S. Eliot…I

want to make his wild one-of-a-kind poetic voice my own, and I want to write

about what he writes about, the world that needs to be written about, the world

ignored by too many people, the world of brutality against the good people

deprived of justice and love.”

—John Guzlowski, author of Echoes of Tattered Tongues

“Doing Drive-bys on How to Love in the Midwest is about loving, losing, and honoring

the moments of life we do have…his perspective on this life, now, in this place, holds

us accountable to find all the “beautiful things” that will break our hearts.”

—Sarah Sandman, author of The Sinew of 47 Years and I Speak Moan

“…this man’s poems are liable to jump right up off the page and dance, so infused

are they with righteous rhythms. But the moves aren’t just for show. Crisler is

after the heart and the hurt inside the contemporary experience.”

—Justin Hamm, author of Drinking Guinness With the Dead

“All the feels I’ve ever felt about what it means to live and love and lay claim to

the Midwest are expressed in Crisler’s poetry. This is what it is to be seen. Doing

Drive-bys on How to Love in the Midwest…is a message, a critical intervention, a

rapturous ode to a way of being.”

—Terrion L. Williamson, Director, Black Midwest Initiative,

& Associate Professor, Black Studies and Gender and Women’s Studies

Bree Jo'ann Flannelly

Bree Jo’ann Flannelly is an artist and educator based in Indianapolis, IN. She is a candidate for an MFA in Creative Writing from Butler University. Her book Black Glitter was published in 2018 by Monster House Press. Her writing has appeared in Sarka Journal, Poets.org, The Journal Petra and The Indianapolis Review. Follow her on Instagram @cloudprincess87 to learn more about her work, community engagement and radical shenanigans

Liz Whiteacre

Liz Whiteacre’s poetry explores accident, disability, aging, and wellness. She is the author of Hit the Ground and has a chapbook forthcoming this spring called It could account for the panic. Her poems have appeared in Wordgathering, Disability Studies Quarterly, Kaleidoscope, Breath & Shadow, and other publications. Liz is an associate professor of English at the University of Indianapolis. She teaches writing and publishing there, as well as advises Etchings Press.

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