Giants of Poetry Coming to Houston

You don’t have to be a tortured artist to thoroughly enjoy the fantastic poetry of Mary Oliver or Billy Collins, both of whom are coming to Houston next week.

Mary Oliver’s 24 books of poems use imagery from wildlife and the natural world to talk about, well, everything. Her reverence for the seemingly incidental makes you remember why being in nature can be, dare we say, powerful and transcendent.

Inprint is bringing her to town on Monday, April 16th at the 7:30 to the Alley Theatre (615 Texas Avenue). Her most recent book, Thirst, happens to be about the loss of her longtime partner, but don’t expect a grim evening. Here’s where to find some of her poems online.

Tickets are a mere $10 and can be purchased at the door of the Alley on the evening of the reading and discussion.

Billy Collins, former Poet Laureate of the United States, is known as a tremendous and also accessible (read “enjoyable”) poet; he prefers the term “hospitable.” He’s thinking about his readers, and he wants them to enjoy making their way through a poem: “Stepping from the title to the first lines is like stepping into a canoe. A lot of things can go wrong.” Houstonist wishes everyone would be so careful. Collins is also not afraid of humor, something we certainly can't say about everyone.

Collins truly sees poetry as writing for all, and his poetry is. In 2005, he released a bestselling album of himself reading his own poems, Best Cigarette, under the Creative Commons license, meaning anyone can listen to it for free. Houstonist certainly applauds all that is both free and funny.

The Society for the Performing Arts is bringing Collins to Jones Hall (615 Louisiana) on Friday, April 20th. Tickets are $36.75 and can be purchased online or by calling 713.227.4SPA (4772), or by going to the SPA box office.

So get out there and get yourself some poetry!

photo credit for Billy Collins: Juliet Van Otteren