Albany Poets is proud to announce Mary Panza as featured guest at the fourth edition of Albany Poets Presents at Restaurant Navona (formerly The Midtown Tap & Tea Room). Albany Poets Presents puts a spin on the typical poetry event in the local literary community by highlighting one poet every two months with an interview and Q&A session following the reading.
Host Thom Francis says, “This series has been fantastic so far. We kicked everything off with a great evening with Alan Catlin. February we had Dan Wilcox as our feature and for Word Fest we had the great Wil Gibson in town to perform and discuss his work. I can’t wait to hear and talk to Mary about her life and writing.”
Albany Poets Presents will also be recorded live to be distributed through the Albany Poets website and other outlets.
The fourth Albany Poets Presents reading will be on Wednesday, June 15 starting at 7:00PM featuring local poet Mary Panza at Restaurant Navona, 289 New Scotland Avenue, Albany.
Mary Panza, Vice President of Albany Poets, a community based organization dedicated to bringing poetry and spoken word to the Capital Region and beyond. She originated and hosted the poetry open mic at Border’s and has been a driving force in the poetry community for almost 30 years. She has been active in promoting, hosting, and participating in many arts events throughout Upstate New York.
Mary has published a number of poetry chapbooks with Gina Grega (Hair Buffet, Komic Kunts, and Bite Me: Love Poems) and Paul Wienman (Three Poets and One Bed, Mary Eats Paul, and Vise Versa). Mary produced and wrote the liner notes for the CD “Volume”, a compilation of Albany area poets performing their work at local readings and open mics and “A Little Nip” a compilation of female singer/songwriters. She has been published in countless publications such as Rant, In Your Face, OTHER:___, Revival: Spoken Work from Lollapalooza 94, and Open Mic: The Albany Anthology. Mary served as the Poetry Editor for the short lived Capital Region edition of Chronogram. She is currently an editor of Albany Poets’ annual journal Up the River.
Currently, Mary is the host of one of Albany Poets longest running monthly poetry open mics, Poets Speak Loud, at McGeary’s Irish Pub.
Mary writes Housewife Tuesday, which chronicles her life as a single mother, a cranky old Italian lady, and a chubby woman looking for peace in a world gone mad.
