Poet, actor and teacher Gary Maggio is accepting submissions of poetry for a Capital Region Poets Workshop he will facilitate, co-sponsored and supported by the New York State Writers Institute at the University at Albany.
The free workshop will meet at the Albany Public Library’s Delaware Avenue branch Community Room (331 Delaware Ave, Albany) every two weeks, on Wednesday evenings from 6:15pm-8:15pm, beginning on January 22, 2020 or shortly thereafter.
The workshop will be limited to 10 poets. The program will look to select a diverse mix of poets who can work well together and provide and accept each other’s input and critical observation with a mutual desire to improve their poems.
The workshop will be open-ended, with no set closing date.
Maggio originally created and facilitated the Capital Region Poets Workshop in the early 2000s, which met twice a month for more than eight years.
Maggio is an alumnus of SUNY Albany as well as several poetry workshops sponsored by the Writers Institute and held on the UAlbany campus. He was a student of the late acclaimed Irish poet John Montague, who was writer-in-residence at the Writers Institute for several years, as well as the renowned Irish-American poet Eamon Grennan. Maggio’s goal is to recreate the creative environment those poets fostered in their workshops, a safe haven and a place to air out poems that are works-in-progress. Maggio will facilitate discussions of each work and encourage shared observations on which elements support the poems and which do not. Such feedback and give-and-take among poets help each writer sharpen her or his craft. Maggio’s intended effect is to create an atmosphere of problem solving for useful feedback.
To apply for a limited spot in the workshop, please email three poems and a brief paragraph describing your experience as a poet and why you wish to join the Capital Region Poets Workshop to: gmagikman@gmail.com and jkowalski@albany.edu. Submissions are due by January 15, 2020.
About Gary Maggio
Gary Maggio began writing poems when he was accepted into John Montague’s poetry workshop at the Writers Institute in 1999. In the early 2000s, he created and facilitated the Capital Region Poets Workshop, which met twice a month for over eight years. He has also worked as an actor in the Albany area for the last decade, performing at Cap Rep, Curtain Call Theatre, Theatre Voices, Homemade Theater and Albany Civic Theatre. He works part-time as a “standardized patient” at Albany Medical College, acting for and teaching communications to medical students and residents.
