All are invited to the Bookey Readings at the Harlow on Friday, May 5 at 7pm, featuring Anna Wrobel (left) and Marita O’Neill (right.) Courtesy Photos.
All are invited to the Bookey Readings at the Harlow on Friday, May 5 at 7pm, featuring Anna Wrobel (left) and Marita O’Neill (right.) Courtesy Photos.

The Bookey Readings at the Harlow continues their 2017 poetry series on Friday, May 5 beginning at 7pm. The event, held at 160 Water Street in Hallowell, features two women well known to Maine poetry: Anna Wrobel and Marita O’Neill. Refreshments are served, and a $3 donation is appreciated at the door to support operating costs at the Gallery.

Both life-long, dedicated teachers, Wrobel and O’Neill present their passion for and knowledge of life, love, and human struggle through spoken word. Their poetry shares experiences that have shaped them into strong, loving, and impacting women who value activism through peace.

Anna Wrobel is an American historian, teacher, and poet. Marengo Street was published by Moon Pie Press in 2012; a second collection is slated for 2018. Educator, scholar of Holocaust Studies, Anna extracts global history and personal narratives into poetic forms in manuscript, Sparrow Feathers, from which her presentation, “Second Generation/First Person,” is derived. Poems are used by history and literature teachers in several states, also in Poland, Germany, Israel and Palestine. Poems, historical essays and critical reviews appear in venues including Cafe Review, Lilith, Off the Coast, Holocaust Human Rights Center of U-Maine, and Jewish Currents (contributing writer). Anna curates Lowry’s Lodge, Maine’s second longest running feature poetry series (after Harlow).

Marita O’Neill is a poet, teacher, and bird admirer. She has lived in Maine for over 20 years and originally hails from the not-so-mean streets of Philadelphia. She earned her MFA in poetry from Vermont College. She is currently teaching high school English to seniors and sophomores at Yarmouth High School. She has published two chapbooks: Love Dogs by Strikestudio Press and Evidence of Light by Moon Pie Press. Her poem “Crow Calling” was recently published in the Deep Water series through the Maine Sunday Telegram and her poem “Dragon” in the Maine Arts Magazine. Lately, she’s exploring what it means, in Pema Chodrin’s words, “to refrain”: “the practice of not immediately filling up space just because there’s a gap.

The Harlow Gallery located in downtown historic Hallowell is home to the Kennebec Valley Art Association, a membership based 501(c)3 nonprofit dedicated to connecting and celebrating art, artists and community in central Maine since 1963.

For more information about the Harlow Gallery or this event visit www.harlowgallery.org or call 207-622-3813.