April 12: Hassen, Devaney, Earnest

Come get some poetry Saturday, April 12th at 8PM from

HASSEN, who writes experimental poetry and creates multimedia work, including photography, audio, video, encaustics and specific, queer gestures. She uses the word queer in the traditional sense, re-claiming the term as a means of self-empowerment that has nothing whatever, or very little, anyway, to do with her sexuality or hairdo. Chapbooks include Salem, Sky Journal from Land, Sky Journal from Sea. Her poems have appeared in Frequency Audio Journal, Skanky Possum, Big Bridge, Dusie and elsewhere. You can read her work at hassens.blogspot.com

THOMAS DEVANEY, the author of A Series of Small Boxes (Fish Drum, 2007) and The American Pragmatist Fell in Love (Banshee, 1999). Projects with Institute of Contemporary Art (Phila.) include “New Invisible Cities” for “The Puppet Show” exhibition (2008) and "The Empty House" tour at the Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site for "The Big Nothing" exhibit (2004). Recent work has appeared in The Sienese Shredder, jubilat, and The American Poetry Review. He is editing a feature section on George Oppen for Jacket 38 entitled “Oppen at 100.” He is a Senior Writing Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania. Read some work here, listen to some here, and visit his blog.

JAIME ANNE EARNEST, a sleep-deprived graduate student at the Drexel University College of Medicine in the school of Public Health. She writes poetry in Epidemiology seminars. She answers to (in descending order of likely response): James, Jay, mamacita, sexy, J-dogg, Jame, JJ, Miss Earnest, and yo bitch. She is a native Philadelphian (but she gets around), hates the dirty Jerz and everyone in/from it (except Kyle), and is committed to evidence based medicine, human rights (except for New Jersey), social justice, poetry, singing under the El, and cats. She believes love is the primary principle by which to live, and knows that if you crumble cool ranch Doritos into Wawa macaroni salad, you'll never regret it.