Beyond Baroque hosts an evening of poetry in tribute to American poet Dorothy Barresi. Though born in New York, Dorothy is a poet and scholar who made Los Angeles her home. She’s been a mentor to aspiring writers and students of Cal State Northridge through her tenure in the English Department as a professor of English Literature and Creative Writing. As an active poet in the literary scene of Los Angeles for several decades, her poetry has been anthologized in Poetry Los Angeles: Reading the Essential Poems of the City and numerous literary journals. She’s served as a judge of the Los Angeles Times Book Award in Poetry and published five collections of poetry, including What We Did While We Made More Guns (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018); Post-Rapture Diner (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1996), winner of the American Book Award; and All of the Above (Beacon Press, 1991), winner of the Barnard College New Women Poets Prize.
The evening will feature tributes from poets, former students, and colleagues . The event will be MC’ed by Dan Murphy, and feature readings by writers Kim Young, Patty Seyburn, Suzanne Lummis, Lynne Thompson, Marsha De La O, Iván Salinas, Elena Karina Byrne (virtual), and Barresi, followed by a brief Q&A facilitated by poet Kim Young.
Dorothy Barresi is the author of What We Did While We Made More Guns (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018); American Fanatics (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2010); Rouge Pulp (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2002); Post-Rapture Diner (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1996), winner of the American Book Award; and All of the Above (Beacon Press, 1991), winner of the Barnard College New Women Poets Prize. She is also the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the North Carolina Arts Council. She teaches at California State University at Northridge and lives in the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles.
Kim Young is a writer, teacher, and author of two books of poetry: Night Radio, winner of the Agha Ali Shahid Poetry Prize and finalist for the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, and Tigers, a collection of prose poems. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Alta, Los Angeles Review of Books, TriQuarterly, The Cincinnati Review, and elsewhere. For many years, she edited the literary journal Chaparral, which features interviews and new writing from Maggie Nelson, Jericho Brown, Victoria Chang, and many others. She is currently at work on a hybrid book of memoir, journalism, and biography on the late poet Lee McCarthy.
Patty Seyburn has published five collections of poems: Threshold Delivery (Finishing Line Press, 2019); Perfecta (What Books Press, Glass Table Collective, 2014); Hilarity, which won the Green Rose Prize given by New Issues Press (Western Michigan University, 2009); Mechanical Cluster (Ohio State University Press, 2002); and Diasporadic (Helicon Nine Editions, 1998), which won the 1997 Marianne Moore Poetry Prize and the 2000 American Library Association’s Notable Book Award. Her work has appeared in numerous anthologies and publications, including The Bloomsbury Anthology of Contemporary Jewish American Poetry, Wide Awake: Poetry of Los Angeles and Beyond, The Paris Review, Poetry, New England Review, and Boston Review. She is a Professor at California State University, Long Beach.
Suzanne Lummis was born in San Francisco and grew up in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Her collections include Idiosyncrasies (1984), In Danger (1999), and Open 24 Hours (2014), which received the Blue Lynx Poetry Prize from Lynx House Press. Her poems have appeared in Ploughshares, New Ohio Review, Hudson Review, Antioch Review, Plume, and The New Yorker. She was the co-editor of The Pacific Coast Poetry Series from Beyond Baroque Books, editor of its first publication, Wide Awake: Poets of Los Angeles and Beyond. Lummis was a 2018-19 City of Los Angeles Fellow, an endowment from the Cultural Affairs Department allowing mid-career visual artists and writers to complete major projects.
Lynne Thompson is the former 2021 Los Angeles Poet Laureate and 2022 Poet Laureate Fellow of the Academy of American Poets. She is the author of four collections of poetry: Beg No Pardon; Start With a Small Guitar; Fretwork; winner of the 2019 Marsh Hawk Poetry Prize; and Blue on Blue Palette, which will be published by BOA Editions in April 2024. The recipient of multiple awards and fellowships including several Pushcart Prize nominations, Thompson sits on the Boards of Poetry Foundation, Cave Canem, and Los Angeles Review of Books, and she is the most recent Chair Emerita of the Board of Trustees at Scripps College. Her recent work can be found or is forthcoming in Best American Poetry, New England Review, Black Warrior Review, Massachusetts Review, The Common, and Copper Nickel, among others.
Elena Karina Byrne is a freelance editor, lecturer, Programming Consultant & Poetry Stage Manager for The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, and Literary Programs Director for the Ruskin Art Club. Pushcart Prize & Best American Poetry recipient, Byrne’s five collections include If This Makes You Nervous (Omnidawn, 2021), No Don’t (What Books Press, 2020), Squander (Omnidawn, 2016), MASQUE (Tupelo Press, 2008), and The Flammable Bird (Zoo Press/Tupelo Press, 2002). Poems, reviews, and interviews can be found in Poem-a-Day, Plume, POETRY, The Paris Review, The Adroit Journal, Los Angeles Review of Books, Kenyon Review, BOMB, Verse Daily, Poetry Daily, Narrative, NPR's KNAU Poetry Snaps Morning Edition / All Things Considered, and elsewhere. Byrne currently is writing screenplays while completing her collection of hybrid essays entitled Voyeur Hour.
Marsha de la O’s new book, Creature, came out from Pitt Poetry Series this January. Her previous book, Every Ravening Thing, also from Pitt, came out in 2019. Antidote for Night won the 2015 Isabella Gardner Award and was published by BOA Editions. Her first book, Black Hope, was awarded the New Issues Press Poetry Prize and was published by New Issues Press. She holds an MFA in Poetry from Vermont College and has published extensively in journals and anthologies, including two recent poems in The New Yorker and a poem selected by Tracy K. Smith for The Slowdown.
Dan Murphy is a former elementary school teacher and author of two chapbooks: The Book of False Rhyme and Seasick Serenade (forthcoming). His writing has been published in Field, Beloit Poetry Journal, Spillway, Zyzzyva, Image, Los Angeles Review, North American Review, Cortland Review, and other worthy journals. Murphy lives in Los Angeles with his family and relentless caffeine addiction.
Iván Salinas is an undocumented poet, co-editor of Drifter Zine, and Programs Manager at Beyond Baroque. His work has been published in The Acentos Review, Litstack, La Raiz Magazine, and elsewhere. He is publishing a bilingual zine-turned-chapbook, Dealer: prosa poetica for a carcacha, in 2024. He lives in Panorama City with Madi and their dog Rocket.