Woodland Pattern

Woodland Pattern Woodland Pattern is a nonprofit book center dedicated to poetry & the arts, for people of all ages.
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Woodland Pattern is a nonprofit book center dedicated to the discovery, cultivation and presentation of contemporary literature and the arts.

🍀📖 Poetry Reading: Poetry in the Park 📖🍀TUES, June 9, 6:30 pm // Rain date: Wed. Jun. 10*IN PERSON at Juneau Park[Link ...
06/02/2026

🍀📖 Poetry Reading: Poetry in the Park 📖🍀

TUES, June 9, 6:30 pm // Rain date: Wed. Jun. 10
*IN PERSON at Juneau Park
[Link in profile]

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Bring your blankets and chairs, snacks and drinks, and friends, and join us at the Solomon Juneau statue for this beloved summer reading series. Poetry in the Park takes place in Juneau Park on the second Tuesday of June, July, August, and September, with rain dates scheduled on the second Wednesday of each month. This season’s events are made possible with support from Juneau Park Friends.

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Shana Wilson, who goes by the name Blue Lotus, is a lover of words, good music, and creativity. She is a poet, spoken-word artist, photographer, and massage therapist, who uses her voice and sound to encourage healing, reflection, and hope. The healing power of poetry was introduced to her around age 7; she’s been an active listener, reader, and writer of it ever since. When the weather allows, she can usually be found near a body of water playing one or more of her singing bowls or her Djembe named Ocean.

Gina Cornejo is a Milwaukee-born, raised, and reunited autobiographical writer, immersive storyteller, solo performer, actor, and self-proclaimed professional feelings-haver. The daughter of a Peruvian mariachi singer and a professional jazz dancer from Chicago, Gina’s captivation with the arts began in her bloodline. She believes our distinct path of artistic expression is based on the risk of venturing out to seek within.

Nick Demske is the author of Nick Demske (Fence Books, 2010). A librarian at the Racine Public Library and County Supervisor for Racine County’s First District, Demske is the co-founder of the BONK! Poetry and Music series and co-founder of the Joshua Glover Justice Fund, a bail fund for people incarcerated pretrial in Racine County.

[Bios continues in comments]

Welcome to our 🔎 More About 🔎 series and celebrate with us the small presses, authors, and books from our Small Press Su...
06/02/2026

Welcome to our 🔎 More About 🔎 series and celebrate with us the small presses, authors, and books from our Small Press Subscription Program!

Presenting our second small press, author, and book from the July Bundle, which you can sign up for by June 15th [link in profile]:

📚 Bench Editions 📚 A young press (started in 2024) based in Cincinnati, “Bench Editions is an independent publisher of contemporary fiction and poetry. We hold no allegiance to any particular aesthetic, genre, or form, but are dedicated to ambitious, energizing, imaginative writing, both in English and translation. We release 2-4 books per year.”

✨ Kylan Rice ✨ is the author of An Image Not a Book (2023), Name & Earth (2026), and Cloud on Page Opposite (forthcoming 2027). He edits Thirdhand Books and teaches as an assistant professor at Utah State University.

🍃 Name and Earth (2026) 🍃 To quote Cass Donish’s praise for the book: “Intellectually lush, channeling chicory and Keats, Kylan Rice’s poetic voice pries open a mirror; we step through it into an inverted world that belongs to this unique mind, this distinctively ardent language.”

Check out our full micro-interview with Kylan in the comments below!

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kylan.rice

Woodland Pattern, a founding member of the Poetry Coalition, is accepting applications for a paid Poetry Coalition Fello...
06/01/2026

Woodland Pattern, a founding member of the Poetry Coalition, is accepting applications for a paid Poetry Coalition Fellowship position. This position is 20 hours per week from September 2, 2026, to June 30, 2027. The total stipend is $20,000 plus $1,100 toward health care.

The Poetry Coalition is a national alliance of nearly thirty organizations dedicated to working together to promote the value poets bring to our culture and the important contribution poetry makes in the lives of people of all ages and backgrounds.

Founded in Milwaukee in 1979 as a forum and resource center for poets and other artists in the Great Lakes region, Woodland Pattern is dedicated to the discovery, cultivation, and presentation of poetry and the arts. Home to a nationally recognized collection of small-press poetry and offering annually more than 400 activities and events, Woodland Pattern promotes a lifetime practice of reading and writing through programs that encourage exchange across the visual, performing, and literary arts.

For more information and/or to apply, please visit woodlandpattern.org/opportunities or find 🌟 the link in our bio 🌟

Applications are due by July 15 ❕❕❕

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Images from

Each week, 📻 Woodland Pattern Radio 📻 broadcasts selections from nearly five decades of Woodland Pattern’s visiting poet...
05/29/2026

Each week, 📻 Woodland Pattern Radio 📻 broadcasts selections from nearly five decades of Woodland Pattern’s visiting poets, artists and musicians. And monthly, we re-share an episode from the glimmering depths of our archive.

Today we revisit episode 23: Merrill Gilfillan (2024) & Tom Raworth (2012)

This episode presents poet and alfresco essayist Merrill Gilfillan’s full Sunday, March 31, 2024 virtual reading for the North Central reading series, followed by a clip from Tom Raworth’s 2012 Woodland Pattern visit. Our intro music features the Mike Reed Ensemble and closing music features poet Tom Raworth on the music box in collaboration with Milwaukee saxophonist Steve Nelson-Raney.

Thank you as always for tuning in.

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We invite you to check out the Woodland Pattern Radio Hour page for more archived episodes, and visit Woodland Pattern on SoundCloud to hear the full programs from which these readings and concerts were broadcast.

For new episodes: Tune in at WXRW 104.1 if you’re in the neighborhood, or stream from anywhere via the Riverwest Radio website each Saturday 6-6:30PM CT.

[All links in bio]

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🙌 Special Event: Locust Street Festival 🙌SUN., May 31, kicking off at 11:30 am CDT*IN PERSON*Please join us for our last...
05/27/2026

🙌 Special Event: Locust Street Festival 🙌

SUN., May 31, kicking off at 11:30 am CDT
*IN PERSON*

Please join us for our last Locust Street Festival. Cheering to 46 years at 720 E. Locust St. with a book sale (help us lighten our inventory!), plus an art activity, and good company!

More about the booksale: There will be lots of donated books and some stuff from our overstock with $1, $5, and $10 book tables 😉

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🔊 Open Mic: resound return 🔊 Our last one in Riverwest!This FRIDAY, May 29, 7:00 pm*IN PERSON*[Link in profile]~~~No poe...
05/26/2026

🔊 Open Mic: resound return 🔊 Our last one in Riverwest!

This FRIDAY, May 29, 7:00 pm
*IN PERSON*
[Link in profile]

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No poetic forecast this spring—just pure gratitude for everyone who has sat in the audience or signed up for the dice roll. What started as a seedling has grown to a perennial bloom. Opening our podium to the wider community each month has been one of the highlights of our programming. As we prepare to move into a new space, we’re thankful for the voices that have filled this building.

resound return is hosted on Fridays near the end of the month. Register upon arrival; reading begins at 7:10 pm.

Rest assured: resound return will continue in our new space.

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OTHER OPEN MICS AROUND MILWAUKEE
This list was current when it was created; please consult the individual venues to confirm accuracy.

SUNDAYS
Tabi Po @ County Clare–3rd Sunday of the month | 3-4 PM

MONDAYS
Bremen Café RW (comedy) | 8 PM
Linneman's | 7:30-10 PM

TUESDAYS
The Freight 38 Food for Thought (food, music, vendors, etc.) | 7-11 PM | $5 entry

WEDNESDAYS
UWM Lyrical Sanctuary monthly | Workshop: 7-7:45 PM Open Mic: 8-10 PM

THURSDAYS
Bi-weekly Writer's Hive Poetry Open Mic HoneyBee Sage Wellness | Doors open at 6 PM, open mic starts at 6:30 PM

FRIDAYS
Woodland Pattern resounds return–last Friday of the month | 7 PM

📖 Poetry Reading: Janet Jennerjohn and Michele Kotler 📖THURS, May 28, 7 pm CDT*HYBRID* In person & Online // $Give What...
05/26/2026

📖 Poetry Reading: Janet Jennerjohn and Michele Kotler 📖

THURS, May 28, 7 pm CDT
*HYBRID* In person & Online // $Give What You Can
[Link in profile]

Join us for a reading in celebration of Janet Jennerjohn’s chapbook, The Moment Before (Woodland Pattern, 2026), featuring readings from Janet along with Michele Kotler.

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Janet Jennerjohn, an alum of the UWM creative writing graduate program, recently retired from MATC after 30+ years of teaching College English. She divides her time between Milwaukee and Door County with her husband Mauricio and their dog Django. She is the author of a bilingual chapbook, Cara dividida/Divided Face and the forthcoming chapbook, The Moment Before. Her poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, SWWIM Every Day, Sheltering with Poems, and the Wisconsin Poets’ Calendar, among others.

Michele Kotler is a poet living in New York City, the city that birthed and raised her. She received her MFA in Poetry from the University of Michigan after receiving her BA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College. She is the founding director of the Community-Word Project, a teaching artist training and artist in the schools organization. Her poetry has appeared in American Poetry Review, Washington Square Review, Spinning Jenny, Painted Bride Quarterly, and SWWIM Everyday.

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Welcome to our 🔎 More About 🔎 series and celebrate with us the small presses, authors, and books from our Small Press Su...
05/23/2026

Welcome to our 🔎 More About 🔎 series and celebrate with us the small presses, authors, and books from our Small Press Subscription Program!

Presenting our first small press, author, and book from the July Bundle, which you can sign up for by June 15th [link in profile]:

📚 Further Other Book Works 📚 is a poetry and art book press based in North Carolina and published by poets Julia Drescher and C.J. Martin. Recent titles include Norma Cole's Drawings, Beverly Dahlen's Something/Nothing: Essays and Talks, and Candace Hill Montgomery & David Grundy's collaboration, Abstractive.

✨ Candace Hill Montgomery ✨'s work spans painting, photography, installation, assemblage, textiles and writing. Recent publications include Abstractive, Candace Hill and David Grundy (Further Other Books Works, 2026); the collection Muss Sill (Distance No Object, 2020) and Short Leash Kept On (Materials, 2022), a long poem inspired by detective fiction and the writing of Lloyd Addison and Russell Atkins.

*Portrait taken by photographer Rick Wenner in 2025.

✨ David Grundy ✨ is a poet and scholar. He is the author of A Black Arts Poetry Machine: Amiri Baraka and the Umbra Poets (2019), Present Continuous (2022), and A True Account (2023), and, with Candace Hill Montgomery, Abstractive (2026), and co-editor, with Lauri Scheyer, of Selected Poems of Calvin C. Hernton. Never by Itself Alone: Q***r Poetry in Boston and San Francisco, 1944–Present was published by Oxford University Press in 2024. He co-runs the small press Materials.

🖼 Abstractive 🖼 This book draws its title and spirit from the great Cleveland artist, musician, and poet Russell Atkins. Here is Craig Dworkin’s descriptive praise: “For Russell Atkins, the ‘psychovisualist’ composes structured relationships that can be viscerally felt by the mind’s eye. In Abstractive, readers learn to lean on the way those structures snare hidden connections: between visual and language arts, music and emotion, and everyone out there searching for the ancient heavenly connection. We are on the cusp.”

Check out our full micro-interview with Candace and David in the comments below!

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😁 0 days 😁As a way of counting down the days leading up to 🌻A Homecoming Farewell: A Weekend of Readings and Reunions in...
05/22/2026

😁 0 days 😁

As a way of counting down the days leading up to 🌻A Homecoming Farewell: A Weekend of Readings and Reunions in Riverwest🌻 (which starts tonight at 7 pm CDT!), we’re sharing the memories you shared with us alongside photos and memorabilia from Woodland Pattern’s archives.

Today we have a grouping that remembers the people that made and make Woodland Pattern Woodland Pattern.

For over forty years and going forward, Woodland Pattern's seeks to serve as a bridge between local and national communities of poets, artists, and musicians while offering a space for people in our immediate community to gather, learn, perform, share ideas, and build relationships that make us stronger.

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A broadside version of the community “I Remember” poem will be given out during the Homecoming Farewell weekend as well. See you there and there!

[Event link in bio]

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Contributors: Elizabeth Robinson, Martha Bergland, Oscar Mireles, Bill Embly, Takahiro Suzuki, David Wilk, Chuck Stebelton, and Jeff Brown.

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The Partnership for the Arts + Humanities Showcase took place last week! Our just named 2026-2027 Milwaukee Youth Poet L...
05/22/2026

The Partnership for the Arts + Humanities Showcase took place last week! Our just named 2026-2027 Milwaukee Youth Poet Laureate Jodie Jasim had her debut reading! Two of our teaching artists—Jackie Valadez and Eloisa Gloria—staffed the Woodland Pattern booth! There were customizable bookmarks! With poems on them! By Jodie and students from Woodland Pattern's after-school Youth Literary Arts Program and Poetry Camp!

If you hadn't guessed from all the exclamation marks, we had an incredible time. 😁

➕ TMJ4 covered the event:

"Ariana Holmes, a recreation supervisor with Milwaukee Recreation, said the showcase highlights the breadth of arts and humanities programming available to young people across the city.

[ . . . ]

Organizations represented at the event included Bembe Drum and Dance, Woodland Pattern, All Hands Boat Works, and Running Rebels, among others.

"We have such a wonderful range that really celebrates the diversity that is the arts and humanities," Holmes said. "We have Bembe Drum and Dance, they're drumming for us and dancing on stage right now. We have Woodland Pattern, who does poetry with young people in Milwaukee. We have organizations that help build boats with young people, All Hands Boat Works, really just an incredible range."

Students can sign up for the programs through Milwaukee Recreation, which connects them with partner organizations that run programming both in schools and at their own locations. Holmes said an arts internship for high schoolers is planned for the summer.

"This summer, we'll be doing an arts internship for older kids, high schoolers to be engaged in arts, so it really is just like a really wonderful diversity of experiences," Holmes said.

Information about Milwaukee Recreation programs is available through the organization's printed guides, which are mailed to Milwaukee residents. Residents are encouraged to pick up the guides and explore opportunities for their children to get involved."

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Watch the videos or read the article through the link in our bio! ✨😉

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Address

720 E. Locust Street
Milwaukee, WI
53212

Opening Hours

Tuesday 12pm - 7pm
Wednesday 12pm - 7pm
Thursday 12pm - 7pm
Friday 12pm - 7pm
Saturday 12pm - 7pm
Sunday 12pm - 7pm

Telephone

+14142635001

Website

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