Dear Friends of Poetry,
On Thursday, November 20th, Poetry Night will feature the poets Julia Levine and Mischa Kuczynski. We meet at 7 p.m. inside the spacious John Natsoulas Gallery at 521 1st Street in Davis, and we hope you can join us!
Our featured poet for November 20 will be Julia Levine.
Julia B. Levine is the poet laureate emerita of the City of Davis. Levine’s poetry has won many awards, including a 2021 Nautilus Award for her fifth poetry collection, Ordinary Psalms, (LSU press, 2021), and the 2015 Northern California Book Award in Poetry for her fourth collection, Small Disasters Seen in Sunlight, (LSU, 2014).
In recent years, Levine won a 2024 Pushcart Prize in Poetry, the 2024 Terrain Poetry Prize, 2023 Oran Perry Burke Award in Poetry from The Southern Review, as well as a 2022 American Academy of Poetry Poet Laureate Fellowship for her work in building resilience in teenagers related to climate change through poetry, science, and technology. Her work has appeared in many literary journals, including, Ploughshares, The Missouri Review and Prairie Schooner. She earned a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from University of California, Berkeley and an MFA in poetry from Pacific University.
Her new chapbook, Lullaby for the Sixth Extinction, won the Wolfson Poetry Prize and has recently been published by Indiana University Press.
Opening for Levine will be Mischa Kuczynski.
A finalist for the Ruth Lilly Fellowship and the Oxford Poetry Prize, Mischa Kuczynski’s work has appeared in American Poetry Review, Pleiades, Fence, Sinister Wisdom, Honey Literary and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from UC Davis.
Doors and open-mic signups open at 6:30 p.m.; the featured reader begins at 7 p.m.; open mic starts at 8 p.m. Open mic performers will be asked to limit what they share to two items or four minutes, whichever is shorter. The open mic list is typically full by 6:45 p.m. People who show up early to help set up chairs will always earn a spot on the open mic list. We expect open mic favorites Michael Gallowglas, Mercedes Ibañez, Joe Bacchus, and Allegra Silberstein to perform.
The Levine and Kuczynski event will feature snacks and beverages. If you end up joining us for the snacks, feel free to come early to help set up or stay late to help clean up. Poetry Night is a community-run event.
Find out more about the Poetry Night Reading Series in Davis, California by visiting
http://www.poetryindavis.com. Encourage your friends to sign up for the mailing list. To learn more about Dr. Andy’s tiny media fiefdom, check out his weekly podcast at
https://poetrytechnology.buzzsprout.com/. Also, see some of his recent essays on Substack:
https://andyjones.substack.com/. One post lists the almost 400 poets who have ever featured at the Poetry Night Reading Series.
In 2026, Poetry Night will welcome Gabrielle Meyers, Susan Wolbarst, Matthew Mitchell, Connie Johnstone, Bob Stanley, Molly Fisk, Terry Moore, Kelli Russell Agodon, and others.
Please plan to join us on every first and third Thursday of the month at 7 p.m. at the John Natsoulas Gallery for the Poetry Night Reading Series.
Also check out other Arts events in Davis, Literary Art events in Davis, Performances in Davis.
