COUPLET is a quarterly reading series, produced, curated and hosted by poet Leah Umansky since 2011. It features both emerging and established poets
The COUPLET Reading Series is glad to be a part of this year's New York City Poetry Festival again! We have five wonderful readers for you and will be on "The White Horse Stage:"
1. Joanna Furhman
2. Elizabeth Metzger
3. Maya Phillips
4. Heidi Seaborn
5. Purvi Shah
1. JOANNA FUHRMAN is the author of six books of poetry, including To a New Era (Hanging Loose Press 2021), The Year of Yellow Butterflies (Hanging Loose Press 2016), and Pageant (Alice James Books 2009). She is a former poetry editor for Ping Pong and Boog City and served as the Monday-night coordinator for the poetry readings at The Poetry Project from 2001 to 2003 and the Wednesday-night coordinator from 2010 to 2011. She currently teaches poetry writing at Rutgers University and coordinates the Introduction to Creative Writing Classes and the faculty and alumni readings.
2. Elizabeth Metzger is the author of the chapbook, Bed, selected by Mark Bibbins for The Sunken Garden Poetry Prize, forthcoming November 2021 from Tupelo Press. Her second full-length collection, Lying In, is forthcoming from Milkweed in 2023. She is also the author of The Spirit Papers (UMass, 2017), winner of the Juniper Prize for a first book of poetry, and the chapbook The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death (Horsethief, 2017). Her poems have been published in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Poetry Magazine, American Poetry Review, The Nation, and the Academy of American Poets' Poem-a-Day, among other places. She is a poetry editor at The Los Angeles Review of Books.
3. Maya Phillips, born and raised in New York, is the author of the debut poetry collection Erou, published by Four Way Books in 2019. Her second book, NERD: On Navigating Heroes, Magic, and Fandom in the 21st Century, is forthcoming in summer 2022 from Atria Books. Maya received her MFA in poetry from Warren Wilson’s MFA Program for Writers and her BFA from Emerson College. Her poetry has appeared in At Length, BOAAT, The Gettysburg Review, Ghost Proposal, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Vinyl, and more, and her arts & entertainment journalism has appeared in The New York Times, Vulture, Slate, Mashable, American Theatre, and more. Maya currently works at The New York Times and as a freelance writer. She lives in Brooklyn.
4. Heidi Seaborn is author of 2020 PANK Poetry Prize winner An Insomniac’s Slumber Party with Marilyn Monroe, the acclaimed debut Give a Girl Chaos and Comstock Chapbook Award winning Bite Marks. Recent work in American Poetry Journal, Beloit, Copper Nickel, Cortland Review, the Financial Times of London, Missouri Review, The Offing and The Slowdown with Tracy K. Smith and the Washington Post. Heidi is Executive Editor of The Adroit Journal. heidiseabornpoet.com
5. Purvi Shah’s favorite art practices are her sparkly eyeshadow, raucous laughter, and seeking justice. She won the inaugural SONY South Asian Social Service Excellence Award for her leadership fighting violence against women. Her new book, Miracle Marks, explores women, the sacred, and gender & racial equity. With artist Anjali Deshmukh, she creates interactive art at https://circlefor.com/. Their participatory project, Missed Fortunes, documented experiences, celebrations, and pandemic rituals to create poetry and visual art, connection, and a community archive for healing. You can see and purchase the art prints at https://tiny.one/circlefor. Find more @PurviPoets.