Creating community and connection through poetry

May 12-16, 2026

with keynote speaker Aimee Nezhukumatathil, NYT best-selling nature writer, poet and essayist.

The 2026 Festival chapbook contains poems read by invited poets at this year’s Festival together with poems by next year’s poet-in-residence, Glenis Redmond, our keynote presenter Aimee Nezhukumatathil, as well as Maine poets Bruce Willard, t love smith, Ian-Khara Ellasante, Samaa Abdurraqib, and
Betsy Sholl. Cover art by Liz Kalloch.

Episode 32 features Meg Weston reading two poems by Aimee Nezhukumatathil: “When You are Near, I Turn into a Baja Fairyduster” and “What I Learned in Greenland.” Meg and host John Gillespie go on to discuss the question: What does national poetry month mean to you?

Our writer-in-residence has been chosen: poet, teaching artist and imagination activist Glenis Redmond.