FREE
Town Square, Knox Building

Please join us in welcoming the First Forward Poetry Reading. Featured readers from and around the Western New York area will gather to share their words, open doors, close others, and begin something new at this beautiful new space. All are welcome to this free reading in the Town Square! 

Featured Poets

Dan Mckeon
Dan McKeon (they/them) is a poet, editor, and musician living in Philly. They are the editor and programmer of Pretty Cool Poetry Thing and have appeared in Peach Mag, Foundlings, and Vagabond City. They enjoy coffee, socialism, and baseball.

Julio Valentin
Julio Montalvo Valentin is a Latinx poet and writer with severe bouts of neuropathic wanderlust. Julio spends their time pillow fighting their family when they are not writing about the loss that is to come. You can find him knee-deep in assignments at a local college or in a bookstore, looking for the next story or rice dish recipe.

Will La Porte
Will LaPorte (they/them) is a Latinx musician and writer based in Brooklyn, NY. They have been featured in the online publications Peach Mag and Pretty Cool Poetry Thing.

Robin Jorden
Robin Lee Jordan is a writer with a focus on poetry, zines, & collage comics, and an interest in multimodal, collaborative creation. She wrote the chapbooks Morning Blessing Poems (Foundlings Press) and THEY ATE EACH OTHER UP (Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs), and a number of zines. Robin is an organizer for Buffalo’s ZineFest and occasionally maintains the (B)uffalo (A)rt (D)ispensary, a coin-operated, micro-art dispenser. As the Writing Center Director at Just Buffalo Literary Center, Robin runs a creative writing space for teens.

Matthew Bosque (Host)
Matthew Bosque (he/him) is a writer and youth counselor based in Buffalo NY. He h finished his M.A. in English and Innovative writing at the University of Buffalo and is a lover of all the ways writing can bring people together. Currently, He is the College and Career Counselor for the Buffalo Center for Arts and Technology and his work can be found in the My Next Heart Buffalo Anthology, the Boricua En La Luna Writing Anthology, and the Pretty Cool Poetry Thing. He likes small walks, medium size roguelikes, and very large conversations about Hugo from the hit ABC Television series LOST. 

Kaitlyn Lowe
Kaitlyn Lowe, also known as The Galactic Griot, is a storyteller predominantly through the lens of poetry, photography, and filmmaking. She is a Brooklyn to Buffalo transplant by way of Buffalo State University with over 14 years of experience in writing and performing. Her background fuels her artistic eye, searching for poetics in all things--even in what some consider mundane. Kaitlyn's work is a constant exploration of identity seeking to encapsulate experiences that illuminate folks who feel unheard.