Riverwood Poetry Series Stanford Forrester and John Popielaski February 27, 2010

February 27, Saturday, 6:30 pm, $3. and a non-perishable food item
Riverwood Poetry Series

Stanford Forrester and John Popielaski

Stanford M. Forrester is a past president of the Haiku Society of America as well as the editor of bottle rockets: a collection of short verse. Stanford has had poems published in 33 publications in the US, Japan, Canada, Ireland, Romania, England, and Australia. His work has appeared in 22 anthologies, most notably in Haiku edited by Peter Washington in the Everyman’s Pocket Poetry Series published by Knopf and American Zen: A Gathering of Poets published by Bottomdog Press.

In 2004 he took first seat in the 57th Annual Basho Anthology Contest in Ueno, Japan and 3rd place in the Kaji Aso Contest in Boston. In 2001 he was the recipient of the Museum of Haiku Literature Award, given by the Museum in Tokyo and the Haiku Society of America. Most recently he has received an artist fellowship from the Greater Hartford Arts Council. He has been a judge for the Japan Society and the United Nations International School’s Children’s Haiku Contest in the New York City Region for four years.

He has taught workshops at places such as Wesleyan University, the Zen Mountain Monastery, the World Haiku Festival in Bangalore, India, and The Loomis Chaffee School.

John Popielaski attended the State University of New York at Stony Brook and American University. His profile in the back of Contemporary Martyrdom refers to him as, "an itinerant teacher and seasonal laborer;" he in fact worked several years as a mover, a lobsterman, and assisting a tropical biologist before teaching English in Mississippi, New York City, and now at Xavier High School in Connecticut.

Prior to discovering that his passion was teaching, John entertained the idea of becoming a lawyer, however he was disillusioned with the endless monotony of paperwork that the job would entail. Many of his poems have been published in literary journals, and he has been the recipient of a fellowship from the District of Columbia Commission on the Arts and Humanities.

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