POETRY READING APRIL 9

WHO: Rapid City Arts Council and High Plains Writers Group

WHAT: Word 4 Word

WHEN: Saturday, April 9 | 7pm

WHERE: Bruce H. Lien Cultural Café | Dahl Arts Center (Please use Kansas City Street entrance)

PRICE: Free

WORD 4 WORD ~ Spoken Word Event

The Rapid City Arts Council and High Plains Writers group presents Word4Word, a spoken word event on Saturday, April 9 at 7pm at the Dahl Arts Center in the Bruce H. Lien Cultural Cafe.(use Kansas City Street entrance).

Spoken Word is a powerful art form that includes poetry, storytelling, rhyme and performance.

We invite all spoken word artists, authors, readers, reciters and listeners to show up, sign up and perform. Each participant will be called up on a first come, first served basis and will be given up to 7 minutes to recite or read.

All ages are welcome to this family friendly event and refreshments will be available. Help us celebrate, support and grow spoken word performance in our community.

The Rapid City Arts Council receives support from generous members and donors, Allied Arts Fund, the City of Rapid City, and the South Dakota Arts Council with funds from the State of South Dakota, through the Department of Tourism and the National Endowment for the Arts. The Dahl Arts Center is a municipal facility managed by the Rapid City Arts Council and owned by the City of Rapid City.

Next Event in Rapid City

Know that we have information about ongoing statewide contests and upcoming opportunities for writers onsite and ready.

Poetry Event Next Week

Upcoming Event

Word 4 Word  Presented by the Rapid City Arts Council Saturday, May 30 | 7:30pm, doors open at 7 for social time Bruce H. Lien Cultural Cafe Show up. Sign up. Get up! All spoken word artists, poets, rhymers, authors, and readers welcome to share the mic. Sign up the night of the event for 7 minute  time slots. This event is FREE and open to the public. Refreshments available.

2014 Fall/Winter Poets Coffeehouse

High Plains Writers, Backroom Productions and the Rapid CIty Arts Council invite you to 2014 Fall Poets Coffeehouse. Come and share a night of poetry and spoken word arts from 7:30-9:30 December 12 at Dahl Arts Center. Coffee provided by High Plains Writers.

Please join us in the Bruce H. Lien Cultural Cafe and enter from the Kansas City Street entrance.

Demographics of a Poetry Anthology

Our annual poetry contest is open to everyone, but is primarily advertised in Rapid City. It's no surprise that most of the poets have some connection to Rapid City or other parts of South Dakota. Some were born here and moved away, some moved back here after moving away, some moved here from other places and some were just passing through. Today our to-be-anthologized poets can be found as far away as Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Peru as well as in the states Oregon, Arizona, Colorado, Michigan, Vermont and also in Washington, D.C. Rapid City is the most heavily represented part of South Dakota but the poets can be found in other SD cities as well: Sioux Falls, Brookings, Vermillion, Pierre and some smaller towns, too. Smaller than Vermillion you say? Yes. Let’s face it, it’s not that hard to do in South Dakota.

For vocations some of our poets make their living with words as editors, journalists, and freelance writers. There are teachers and students. Others are or were librarians, ranchers, military personnel, a nurse and an electrician. More than one came back to poetry after retirement.

The poems themselves are wide ranging in form and texture. Many celebrate the beauty of the natural world. Some tell stories of the past or present, some capture small moments in time.

Robert Furrow, Man of Many Categories: Military, Retired, Published, World-travelled, Octogenarian, South Dakota Returnee

Poet: Robert Furrow
Poem: Little Man
Award: 2011, Honorable Mention

"I am 87 years old, and wrote some poems while attending New Underwood High School, but let my interest drop after that.  I graduated in 1944, then enlisted in the Navy.  I liked it so I stayed for 30 years, then worked another 20 years in Civil Service for the Navy.
About 1975 I got interested in poetry again, as well as lyric writing. Several entries to a Nashville contest got nowhere.
Then while I was living in Pennsylvania, a friend got me started posting poems on line, at Prose-n-Poetry.

I built quite a collection and got some very nice critiques from other poets. Then in 2002, Prose-n-Poetry decided to publish an anthology, called "Tides of the Heart, the Best of Prose-n-Poetry." They selected four of my poems, and I even got a little royalty money from that.
That was the year I moved to Spearfish, and joined the Spearfish Writers Group. One of our exercises was to write a short story.  My story kept getting longer and longer so I finally turned it into a book.  I published it in 2009, under the title "The Accidental Executioner."  I call it a murder-mystery-romance novel.

When I found I could get a book published I decided to collect all my other works and put them in a book. In 2012 I published "Lyrics, Limericks and Poems."  Little Man is included in the book. As a matter of interest, I submitted Little Man to Cowboy Poetry and they rejected it. They said, not because it was a bad poem, but it didn't fit their guidelines."