Feb. 16 LoverSpeak Poetry Reading at Cal Poly to Offer Pros and Cons of Love

SAN LUIS OBISPO – Student and faculty poets will read provocative poems about romantic love during Cal Poly’s LoverSpeak poetry reading at 8 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 16, in Room 104 of the Graphic Arts Building on campus.

The poems range from purely romantic and somewhat erotic to deeply serious and screamingly hilarious, according to poet and English Professor Kevin Clark. “Some readers will offer traditionally positive perceptions of love; others will have caustic views of romance. All kinds of poems will be offered, from classic rhyming poems in the Keatsean tradition to fast-paced colloquial poems in the Beat tradition.”

The editors of Cal Poly’s literary journal, Byzantium, started LoverSpeak as a fundraiser about 10 years ago. “It has evolved into this often comic, raucous recitation of verse about the most archetypal of all poetic subjects: love,” Clark said. “We’ve had people literally screaming with laughter at funny poems, and we’ve had people nearly in tears from elegiac love poems.”

Many of the poems are original works, some are previously published poems from the deep past or more recent times.

Tickets to LoverSpeak are $3 for the public and $2 for students. All attendees will be entered in a raffle to win a variety of gifts from local restaurants, coffee and yogurt shops, and other stores in San Luis Obispo.

The poetry reading is sponsored by Cal Poly’s English Department. For more information, contact Byzantium co-editor Brita Shallcross at 925-998-2218 or bmshallc@calpoly.edu.

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