With Buffalo Speaks at the Buffalo Ironworks, the Silo City Reading Series, and a Blue Bag Press reading at Fitz Books, it’s a torrid week in the Buffalo poetry community.

Tuesday, July 14, 7 p.m. to 8 p.m.: Buffalo Reading Invasion—a flash mob-like gathering to celebrate the role of books, reading, public space, and community in our lives. Bring a book, a chair, and several friends or family members for an hour of quiet reading in one of Buffalo’s best-loved public spaces. This month’s location: South Lawn in front of the historic Hayes Hall on the University at Buffalo South Campus. Free parking is available in UB’s Townsend and Parker lots. Visit

http://buffaloreadinginvasion.com/ for additional details.



Wednesday, July 15, 5 p.m.: Second Anniversary Party for The Buffalo Hive.

Location: The Buffalo Olde Brewery, 1221 E Lovejoy, in the Lovejoy district of Buffalo, NY 14206. Admission is free and Jenuine Cello will be performing. It’s a chance to meet some of The Buffalo Hive’s contributors, collaborators, board members and editors.

Happy hour drink prices will be in place from 4 to 7 pm, and until 9 p.m. for Hive members, contributors and collaborators. Happy hour food prices will be available from 4-6pm. And because it’s a birthday celebration, there will be cake!



Thursday, July 16, 7 p.m.: BUFFALO SPEAKS on 716 Day: a multi-media spoken word performance showcase the scale of which Buffalo has rarely seen. This curated veteran line up of spoken word artists and performers is presenting new individual work and collaborations to create a united show, rather than seven separate features. Doors open at 6 p.m. Performances run from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. with an intermission

Location: Buffalo Iron Works, 49 Illinois St., Buffalo, NY 14203



Featured Performers:

Brandon Williamson: Williamson is the creator of the Pure Ink Poetry Slam, and Buffalo’s Slam Master. He has performed nationally and internationally for the last two decades, representing Buffalo on the national level six times.

Robin Lee Jordan: Jordan is a teacher, poet, writer, multi interdisciplinary artist, event organizer, & zinemaker who values youth empowerment; creating accessible platforms for people to share their work & ideas; activating artists in service of their communities; artistic spontaneity; and creating encouraging spaces. Receiving an MFA in Poetry from Oregon State University, Robin has produced many zines, and published multiple chapbooks of poetry. With her partner, writer-musician Adam Drury, Robin will be making her debut in poetry/punk rock performance.

Deia Elwadi: Elwadi’s poetry is a reflection of her internal dialogue, a testament to the human experience in all it’s messy glory. She’s been featured on WBFO’s What’s Next, the Pure Ink Poetry Tapings, and at the Buffalo AKG, among many others. She regularly tours her poetry across the country, recently returning from a stint in Atlanta, GA.



Ten Thousand: Marquis “Ten Thousand” Burton is a spoken word poet, educator, and curator. Working with Shea’s Performing Arts, C.A.O, Say Yes Buffalo, he has taught young writers to discover their voice through poetry while celebrating their stories for more than a decade. He has represented Buffalo in National Poetry Slams for a decade and was the official team coach for three years. He was also the curator of poetry talent for the Music is Art festival for six years. Ten Thousand is perhaps Buffalo’s leading free-style spoken word artist.

Justin Karcher: Karcher is a Best of the Net- and Pushcart-nominated poet and playwright born and raised in Buffalo, NY. He is the author of several books, including Tailgating at the Gates of Hell (Ghost City Press, 2015). Recent playwriting credits include The Birth of Santa (American Repertory Theater of WNY) and The Trick is to Spill Your Guts Faster Than the Snow Falls (Alleyway Theater).

Megan Kemple: Kemple is a multidisciplinary writer, performer, & teaching artist. In 2025, her latest chapbook A Heretic Without a Home was released through Arcana Press, and two of her short plays, “Tough Love“ and “Where There’s a Will“ were produced as part of the Chain Theatre’s One Act Festivals Off-Broadway. As a slam poet she placed 3rd in the Rookie Slam at the National Poetry Slam 2017, and 3rd in the NUPIC Slam at NPS 2018, where her team placed in the top 10.

Ben Brindise: Brindise is a writer living and working in Buffalo, NY. His poetry has appeared in places such as The Buffalo News, Buffalo Spree, the My Next Heart: New Buffalo Poetry anthology, and Just Buffalo Literary Center’s Poem of the Week. He is the co-creator of the Caffe Aroma Poetry Night Open Mic and has represented Buffalo, NY at the national level four times. His debut chapbook, ROTTEN KID, was archived at Poets House in NYC in 2017.



Tickets:

Pre-Sale – $30

Door – $35

VIP – $75 (limited to 25, VIPs receive a meet ‘n’ greet with the artists, balcony access, and a merch package with signed books, prints, and more from the artists)

4-Pack – $100



Prices listed include all taxes & fees.



Friday, 7 p.m.: Blue Bag Press presents “Catch a Break from Buffalo’s NO FUN SUMMER” with readings by poets Amie Zimmerman, Joe Hall, and Thom Eichelberger-Young with Diego Espiritu as host of the reading.



The reading will serve as the the book launch event for Amie Zimmerman’s debut collection False Spring (Roof Books, 2026). Amie Zimmerman is the author of four chapbooks, including Compliance (Essay Press) and, with artist Samantha Yun Wall, the collaboration 31 Days/The Self (Ursus Americanus). Alongside Hajar Hussaini and Matthew Klane, she co-curates the poetry and performance series Salon Salvage. Zimmerman is from Portland, Oregon, and lives in upstate New York, where she works as a hairstylist, labor organizer, and PhD candidate.



Fitz Books and Waffles, 1462 Main St., Buffalo.



Saturday, July 18, 7 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.: Just Buffalo Literary Center’s Silo City Reading Series featuring poets Mary Ruefle and Sasha Debevec-McKenney as featured performers at an event also featuring a musical performance by guitarist William Tyler, and an installation by visual artist Julia Dzwonkoski.



About the Poets and Featured Performers:



Mary Ruefle is the author of many books, including The Book (Wave Books, 2023), Dunce (Wave Books, 2019), which was a finalist for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize, longlisted for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics’ Circle Award, as well as a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize. She is also the author of My Private Property (Wave Books, 2016), Trances of the Blast (Wave Books, 2013), Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures (Wave Books, 2012), a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism, and Selected Poems (Wave Books, 2010), winner of the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America. She has also published a comic book, Go Home and Go to Bed! (Pilot Books/Orange Table Comics, 2007), and is an erasure artist, whose treatments of nineteenth century texts have been exhibited in museums and galleries and published in A Little White Shadow (Wave Books, 2006). Ruefle is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Robert Creeley Award, an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Guggenheim fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, and a Whiting Award. She lives in Bennington, Vermont, where she served as the state’s poet laureate from 2019 to 2024.

Sasha Debevec-McKenney is the author of the poetry collection Joy Is My Middle Name. She received her MFA from New York University. She was the 2020–2021 Jay C. and Ruth Halls Poetry Fellow at the University of Wisconsin, and a 2023-2025 Creative Writing Fellow at Emory University. Her poems have appeared in places like The New Yorker, The Yale Review, The Drift, and Granta.



In 2021, Sasha edited the hard-cover anthology That’s So Me: Self-ish Mix for the Buffalo-based online literary magazine Peach Mag.

She was born in Hartford, Connecticut, and is currently an Assistant Professor of Writing at Grand Valley State University.



William Tyler is a guitarist who has spent the last two decades reshaping the landscape of American instrumental guitar. After establishing his voice through essential tenures in Silver Jews and Lambchop, the Nashville native launched a solo career defined by a restless curiosity. His work bridges the gap between country-rearing melodies and postmodern experimentation—blending the spirit of Chet Atkins with the avant-garde textures of Gavin Bryars and electroacoustic abstraction.

His latest album, “Time Indefinite,” marks his first solo effort in five years. Born from the isolation of the pandemic and recorded between Nashville and Los Angeles, the album is a candid, “uneasy, damaged, and honest” exploration of mental health and survival. Collaborating with figures like Four Tet’s Kieran Hebden and producer Jake Davis, Tyler embraces the “hiss and wobble” of antique tape loops and field recordings to anchor his compositions.

Artist Julia Dzwonkoski’s drawings often take the form of existential cartoons. She studied art at SUNY Buffalo and UC San Diego. Her work has been shown at Rivalry Projects (Buffalo), Gattopardo (LA), Harkawik (NY) and Blank Forms (NY) and is collected in the books Two Eyes in an Environment (2023) and 100 More Frogs (2025). Dzwonkoski is currently working on a new series of pictures inspired by the poet and collagist Helen Adam. She lives in Buffalo.

Silo City Reading Series events take place in Marine A grain elevator, behind Duende at Silo City, 85 Silo City Row. Doors open at 7 p.m., and the events begin at 7:30 p.m. Books by featured poets in the series will be available for purchase by Buffalo bookseller Fitz Books. As of July 1, the event is sold out. Contact www.justbuffalo.org for further information.