Samantha Badaoa

Samantha Badaoa

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Samantha Badaoa was the featured reader at Windsor Poetry Slam Tuesday night, and I came in just as she was beginning her dazzling performance. Normally, she is the host of this poetry happening at Phog Lounge on University Avenue in Windsor. I was surprised — seeing as this was Christmas week — to find a standing room only crowd at this bar. And Samantha didn’t disappoint. She delivered an amazing and lively performance, and delighted her audience. Samantha is an up-and-comer and someone who is beginning to have a tremendous impact on the literary community. Besides finishing an English Literature degree at the University of Windsor, she works at Chrysler, and does freelance editing on the side. Of course, she continues to host this poetry slam at this downtown location. Here are some photographs of Samantha in performance.

I grew up in Riverside, and my memories are of the library, reading Mark Twain. And so I wouldn’t miss the opportunity of returning there, but this time to hear poetry. It was billed as “By the river — Poetry & Prose” and sponsored by Urban Farmhouse Press and Cranberry Tree Press, both companies based in Windsor. Readers included Rosalind Knight (That Summer at the Mettawas and Songs of Zambia), Christian Laforet (The Space Between Houses), Denis Robillard (The History of Water), and co-publishers Lenore Langs and Laurie Smith (The Truth abouth Roller Skating; smack in the middle of spotlit obvious (Urban Farmhouse Press, 2016). Laurie Smith read a brilliant poem about Jeffrey Dammer, also known as the Milwaukee Cannibal, an American serial killer and sex offender. It was a haunting and perfectly written piece, and it silenced the room. Rosalind Knight read some amazing work from her experiences on a trip to Zambia. Denis Robillard and Christian Laforet began the evening to a packed house. Robillard is quickly developing a reputation as a formidable poet in this city, and now his work is published with Cranberry Tree Press. These are my photographs of the night.

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Daniel Lockhart writes about his participation in the project A Group of Seven (Poets) .

https://pastoralsatori.wordpress.com/2016/12/14/notes-on-new-work-sandwich-sonnets-and-the-windsor-group-of-seven/

A great piece about poetry and the art of paying.

http://lithub.com/how-do-we-pay-the-poets/

Today, the seven of us as part of a unique group of writers met at Suede Productions on Walker Road to review the writing we have been working on since September. In 2017, as part of Windsor’s 125th anniversary, and Canada’s 150th birthday, we will be presenting poems about this city’s heritage. This workshop was aimed at going over the poems we have written to date. The group, sponsored by the Cultural Affairs of the City of Windsor, as part of the poet laureate program, consists of Carlinda D’Alimonte, Mary Ann Mulhern, Daniel Lockhart, Peter Hrastovec, Vanessa Shields and Dorothy Mahoney, all published poets. As poet laureate, I am leading the charge on this, and feel blessed to be working with such talented writers. Our goal is to write about every nook and cranny of this river town. These are my photographs, with the exception of one of me taken by Peter Hrastovec.

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Students in my Editing Practicum at the University of Windsor have just completed a semester where they were editing a new book of poetry by Bruce Meyer and a book about legendary painter Tom Thomson. These books will be published in the spring of 2017.