Just Words Away: A National Poetry Month Event Santa Fe’s Poet Laureates and More

On Friday, April 27, a trio of Santa Fe’s poets laureate offer a treat from their souls to ours. Joan Logghe, Valerie Martinez, and Arthur Sze will read from their works at 6 pm in the New Mexico History Museum Auditorium, followed by a reception in the museum’s Meem Community Room.

The event is free; seating is limited.

Logghe, Santa Fe’s third poet laureate, is nearing the end of her tenure. In honor, the Palace Press is printing a chapbook of her work. April in Santa will be available for purchase ($15; image of the first page at left), along with books and broadsides of all three poets’ works produced by the Palace Press.

For their readings, Logghe, Martinez, and Sze  will bring a body of work celebrating Santa Fe as well as their lives lived in poetry and their cumulative six years as poets laureate. This will mark their first joint reading.

The Santa Fe Arts Commisssion Poet Laureate Program has increased the visibility of the art form, brought more poetry into the schools, and amped up the poetic literacy of an already literate city.  As Joan's bowling shirt says, "City of Poems, City of Poets, The Poem Different."