10/14/2026
Join us for a night of poetry at Florence Art & Museums’ Open Mic Night! Tuesday, October 27th, 6:30 pm at Southall House in Florence. The event will feature original poetry and photography by Jake Berry and Wayne Sides. Afterwards, the floor will be opened to other poets to share their poems. The optional writing prompt for October is: Superstitions.
The photographs and poems published in The Burden of Broken Light are the result of Wayne Sides sending Jake Berry several photographs in response to which Berry composed poems. These award-winning artists have been collaborating for years. Some of their work from this book appears in the publication The Studio. Then, over a three-week period Berry composed 53 poems in response to the photographs. This book is the result.
Wayne Sides is an award-winning photographer, visual artist and musician. He grew up in Alabama and Florida. He is a graduate of the University of Alabama and the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. For over 30 years he taught art in New York and Alabama and is professor emeritus at the University of North Alabama. His photographs, assemblages, and paintings have been exhibited in the United States and Europe including several large career retrospectives.
Jake Berry is a poet, musician and visual artist. His work has been published widely in the U.S. and internationally. His books include The Pandemonium Spirit, Brambu Drezi – Books 1-3, Phaneagrams, Trilogy: Kenosis, The Oracle House and many others. He has also released over a dozen albums of music solo and with the bands Bare Knuckles and Six Mile.
This program is free and is sponsored by Florence Arts & Museums. The Kennedy-Douglass Center for the Arts is located at 217 E Tuscaloosa Street, Florence, AL, and is open Monday - Friday from 9am to 4pm and Sundays from 1pm to 4pm. The event will be held at Southall House, just next to the Art Center office, at 209 E. Tuscaloosa St. Call 256-760-6379 for more information.
