League of Minnesota Poets presents:
2024 Spring Conference – April 19th – 21st
with special guests
Janna Knittel and Megan Muthupandiyan
Country Inn & Suites West – Saint Cloud, MN
- Janna Knittel presents: Recast Risk as Adventure
- Megan Muthupandiyan presents: Of the Earth and Other Desires, the John Rezmerski Manuscript Prize Winner.
- Take the Stage: Step into the spotlight with your spoken words in this noncompetitive dinner show in the upstairs Music Bar at Olde Brick House hosted by spoken word artist and rapper, Terrell X aka: Carnage the Executioner
- League of Minnesota Poets — General Member Meeting & Elections
- Peter Stein presents: Constantly Risking Poetry
- Risky Games: A Poetry Writing Experiment
- Agates IndyBookStore Tour reading at Books Revisited
To book your room at Country Inn and Suites West Call (320) 259-8999. In order to get the room discount be sure to say you’re booking into the League of Minnesota Poets’ block of rooms.
Take the Stage is included in conference registration. Purchase extra registrations for guests by clicking the button above. Registration covers dinner and show.
ABOUT OUR PRESENTERS
Janna Knittel is from the Pacific Northwest and has lived in Minnesota since 2004.
Janna’s first full-length poetry book, Real Work (Nodin Press, 2022) was a finalist for the 2023 Minnesota Book Awards.
Janna has a deep interest in environmental issues and explores them through ecopoetics and documentary poetics. Janna has also written about childhood trauma, grief and loss, and the trials and tribulations of being a slacker (Generation X).
Janna has taught literature and writing classes at colleges and universities in Oregon, Kansas, and Minnesota and writing workshops at North Suburban Center for the Arts and the American School of Storytelling.
Previous publications include the chapbook Fish & Wild Life (Finishing Line Press, 2018) and poems in Blueline, Breakwater Review, Conduit, Constellations, Cottonwood, North Dakota Quarterly, Pleiades, Whale Road Review, and The Wild Word, among other journals, as well as Waters Deep: A Great Lakes Anthology (Split Rock Review, 2018). Recognition includes grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board and the University of Minnesota College of Liberal Arts.
Meg Muthupandiyan is a poet and essayist who feels most at home while walking through the world. A 2023 George Greenia Fellow at the Institute of Pilgrimage Studies, her writing explores how individuals’ embodied experiences within land communities fosters their ecological consciousness.
Her poems, illustrations, photographs, and nature essays have appeared in over thirty journals and anthologies. She teaches writing at the University of Wisconsin Superior. More on her work can be found on her website, meganmuthupandiyan.com
With poems that arise at the intersection among phenological study, place, and memory, Of the Earth and Other Desires celebrates the locus poetica of our land communities and explores what they have to teach those who move through them about desire. This volume was awarded the John Rezmerski Manuscript Prize in 2023 by the League of Minnesota Poets.
Terrell Woods (stage names Carnage The Executioner and TERRELL X) started his musical journey in 1984 – at age 10. Since then, he has spent the last 30 years professionally writing and recording songs, speaking, performing as a one-man band, traveling the world, and educating all ages of people from various socio-economic backgrounds. Carnage approaches musical experimentation with the following goals: provoking thought using words and rhythms; entertaining crowds during live performances; teaching the fundamentals of human beat boxing, song-writing and strengthening stage presence. Carnage is a self-contained instrument. The Minneapolis Star Tribune made the claim that “Carnage’s mouth might be the best drummer in town,” referring to his human beat boxing techniques.
Terrell began living a plant-based lifestyle in 2017. His commitment to eating a vegan diet has allowed him to see the importance of showing empathy towards animals. In 2019, Carnage started a grassroots movement called Plant Based Poets. His mission is to unite lovers of music, as well as people who encourage freedom for each and every living being who depends on the health of Earth’s roots for survival.
Schedule of Events
——- Friday ——-
5:30 pm — Agates Bookstore Tour reading at Books Revisited
7:00 pm – Dinner in the Fiesta Room at Mexican Village (private dining room, 1 minute walk from Books Revisited) People will order and pay for their own meals.
——- Saturday ——-
9:00 am – Open Mic
10:00 am – Opening Presentation
10:30 am – John Rezmerski Manuscript Presentation featuring Megan Muthupandiyan — Of the Earth and Other Desires
11:30 am – General Meeting & Elections
Noon to 1:30 – catered lunch (included)
1:30 pm – Janna Knittel – Recast Risk as Adventure
2:45 pm – Break
3:00 pm – Risky Games: A Poetry Writing Experiment
4:30 pm – Break
6:00 pm – Dinner Buffet (included) at Olde Brick House upstairs in the private Music Bar (cash bar)
6:30-9:30pm: Take the Stage Show in the Music Bar
——- Sunday ——-
9:00 am – open mic
10:00 am – Peter Stein — Constantly Risking Poetry
11:30 – Closing Remarks