On Sunday, June 22, Baton Rouge Gallery is happy to host poets Ed Ruzicka and Raymond Berthelot for a joint poetry reading and book signing. Local singer-songwriter Tim Kulage will perform during the period before the reading begins. As with all Sundays@4 performances, this will be free and open to the public.
Ed Ruzicka
Ed Ruzicka will be reading from “In the Wind’ (Sligo Creek Publishing). This is Ed’s fourth full-length book of poetry. Ed’s poems have appeared in the Atlanta Review, the Chicago Literary Review, Rattle, Canary, and many other literary publications. Ed has been a finalist for many awards and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize more than once. Ed is also president of the Poetry Society of Louisiana. He is a retired occupational therapist in Baton Rouge, where he lives with his wife, Renee.
Poet, Ariel Francisco Henriques Cos, stated, “With the wonderful eye of a traveler, Ed Ruzicka’s ‘In the Wind’ whips us through the world, his visions and his changes. From North America to South, from lightning over the Amari Valley in Crete to a parking lot in Louisiana and many places in between, from poem to poem, this book is alive and restless.”
The poet will field questions and sign copies of “In the Wind.” The book will also be available for purchase.
Raymond Berthelot
Raymond Berthelot is a writer and poet, and author of the chapbooks, The Middle Ages and Border Crossings. His poems have appeared in The Acentos Review, Progenitor, Mantis, Peregrine Journal, Apricity Magazine, The Elevation Review, Journal of Caribbean Literatures, the Carolina Quarterly, DASH Literary Journal, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and many other diverse literary journals. Border Crossings is his second chapbook of poetry with Finishing Line Press. Raymond lives in Louisiana with his wife, Gerardina.
"These eye opening, well-crafted poems by Raymond Berthelot reveal our need for peace and tranquility, give us hope and make us listen to free jazz." - Gabor G. Gyukics, author of a hermit has no plural and detoxification of the body, is a poet, jazz poet, literary translator and Lifetime Beat Poet Laureate of Hungary.
“In Border Crossings, Raymond Berthelot’s poems show us snapshots of scenes from around the world, and intermittently of the Deep South. In these short, precise narrative poems, Berthelot finds beauty in the details of even the most unforgiving landscapes, and he sings to us with a language so evocative and true, it’s easy to lose oneself in the blossoming, often deadly worlds he creates.” - Randolph Thomas, author of Dispensations and The Deepest Rooms, cofounder of the seminal hybrid Southern country/rock band, Flatbed Honeymoon.
Sundays@4 is presented in partnership with the Atchafalaya National Heritage Area whose mission is to enhance the identity of our unique American landscape by preserving and promoting our heritage and by fostering progress for local champions that create authentic, powerful connections between people, culture, and the environment.