Talking With Poets – Melissa Anderson at the Social Justice Center

Thom Francis welcomes local poet and artist Melissa Anderson, who was the featured reader at the Third Thursday Poetry Night at the Social Justice Center in Albany on Thursday, April 17, 2025.

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Melissa Anderson is a multidisciplinary artist whose work is deeply influenced by a search for connection with the physical world, changing seasons, and our relationships with the places we call home. She co-runs the slam poetry team Slam Euphoria, as well as their bi-monthly poetry open mic at Cafe Euphoria in Troy.

That night she read from her book “Dogstar Poems” (Main St. Rag Publishing, 2024), starting off with a poem from her day job making furniture for Chipotle, “Work Song,” and then a pandemic piece, “Bedroom Window Lockdown.”

Melissa explained that “Dogstar” was another name for what is commonly known as “Polaris” or the North Star, & that many of the poems in the book are about looking for direction, as in the poem “Reflexivity.”