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O Miami, the poetry celebration that takes place throughout the month of April has a terrific line-up of events scheduled for 2021.
Last year, the festival was just days away from going live when the COVID-19 shutdowns began and organizers had to cancel all the live events and set up a new schedule of 30 days of readings on Zoom.
“This year, it’s a little closer to what the regular festival will be,” says executive director and founder Scott Cunningham. “There will be a lot of poetry in public places where people can encounter them safely.”
There will also be some workshops online. The workshops will have limited attendance.
Online events can be attended by poetry enthusiasts outside of Miami.
The full schedule of events went online on March 15 at OMiami.org. Subscribers to the O Miami email list received the schedule earlier.
Cunningham is happy that the festival will be closer to normal this year because it helps those poets and performing artists who have been contracted for the event.
“Last year was really hard on them,” he says.
The arts suffered a huge hit from the pandemic. Because performances were cancelled, artists and writers lost a significant part of their income.
“That’s a major part of their living, doing appearances at colleges,” Cunningham says.
This year, Miamians will have the opportunity to write their own poetry during April. The themes include writing an ode/love letter to favorite restaurants, or a favorite road and even a favorite household object. People will be able to write poems inspired by bird watching, or creating art in response to a poem written by someone else.
One of the events ties poetry to sourdough starters. Another involves poetry by patient survivors and caregivers.
They are releasing the last issue of Jai Alai. They started with Issue #10 and this one is the final one, Issue #1.
“The poems were written by Miami elementary students,” he says. “We asked poets to write poems in response.”
One of the big events is a program called “This City Is.” Cunningham said two artists who live in London are combing social media accounts for people using the phrase: “Miami Is.”
“They make short poems out of them,” he says. “We’ll post the poems on the sides of buildings.”
Another new project is the Opa Locka Light District. O Miami received a Public Space Challenge Grant for the event, which will project poems written by residents onto the sidewalks.
Students from Carrolton proposed a project that was approved called Bus Stop Poems.
“They’ll be putting poems on benches,” he says. “They are written by sixth grade students at Carrolton.”
The organization Supporting Women Writers in Miami (SWIM) spearheaded Poetry in Bloom. People can order a poetry floral arrangement from Dolly’s Florists.
“People will find a surprise poem in the floral arrangement,” he says.
The readings include readings by South Florida poets who have new books out this year. There will also be readings for Jai Ali magazine.
And April 27 is the date for the annual Poetry and Pajamas event.
“It’s an open mic for kids where kids are encouraged to dress in their pajamas and read either poetry they wrote or something else,” he says.
The event is open to children from age two to eleven or twelve.
“I remember one year, when my daughter was two, she went up there and said the same word eight times,” he says.
