Next Up to The Mic: Kathleen Anne Smith & Nathan Smith at the Sand Lake Center for the Arts

This week, Thom Francis welcomes poets Kathleen Anne Smith and Nathan Smith to the mic. They shared their work at the 2024 Word Fest Open Mic at the Sand Lake Center for the Arts on April 27, 2024.

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After years away, Word Fest returned.

What began in 2001 as a one-day open mic at Thatcher Park grew into a week-long celebration of poetry and spoken word across the region. On April 27, 2024, the open mic came back to life after a four-year hiatus at the Sand Lake Center for the Arts with an afternoon of featured readers and community voices.

Today, we’re highlighting two of those poets: Kathleen Anne Smith and Nathan Smith.

Kathleen Anne Smith, author of Let the Stones Grow Soft, read poems including “How Do We Home Alone?” Nathan Smith read “Chapters” from his book Cotton Candy Sun and “The Gay Boys Survival Guide: 20 Rules to Reach 25.”