We are excited to host State Poet Matt Mason and two local poets for the Arrows to Aerospace 2019 Poetry Night!
AGES:
All ages.
ABOUT THE POETS:
Matt Mason is the Nebraska State Poet and Executive Director of the Nebraska Writers Collective. He runs poetry programming for the State Department, working in Nepal, Romania, Botswana and Belarus. Mason is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize for his poem “Notes For My Daughter Against Chasing Storms” and his work can be found in numerous magazines and anthologies, including Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry. The author of Things We Don’t Know We Don’t Know (The Backwaters Press, 2006) and The Baby That Ate Cincinnati (Stephen F. Austin University Press, 2013), Matt is based out of Omaha with his wife, the poet Sarah McKinstry-Brown, and daughters Sophia and Lucia.
Fernando Montejano has been writing and performing in Omaha for years, reading at places like the encyclopedia show (a performance variety show) to events like writers resist and fundraisers for mental illness. He's worked with the Nebraska Writers Collective for 7 years and has has had the chance to write and read for groups like NAMI and The Boys and Girls Club. Fernando loves writing about science fiction, fantasy, movies, and how all of that helped shape his world and cope with PTSD.
Clif Mason's poems are forthcoming in two collections: Knocking the Stars Senseless (Stephen F. Austin Press) and Self-Portraits in Which I Do Not Appear (Finishing Line Press). They have also appeared in in the chapbook, From the Dead Before. He is fortunate that his work has been awarded prizes by the Joe Gouveia Outermost Poetry Contest (chosen by Marge Piercy), Writers’ Journal, Plainsongs, the Midwest Writers’ Conference, and the Academy of American Poets. His work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and he has been the recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship to Rwanda, Africa.