At the Literary Cafe, at least 96% of the events, speeches, and embarrassing activities that happen in the Lit, stay in the Lit. It is not quite Vegas, but then we have plenty of water and snow. It is our method of keeping a lid on things so the Feds or vigilantes don't get suspicious. It is also a way to prevent grudges from forming and its devastating repercussions. So in line with that philosophy, we maintain the open culture of forgiveness in spite of the imminent abandonment by one of our feature readers and an impersonal rejection letter for my book from the other.

Okay, the reality is that Kent State's Wick Center sent the letter, not our reader, David Hassler. David is the program and outreach director for the Wick, where he conducts writing workshops in local schools and senior centers. He has received an Individual Artist Fellowship and an Artists and Communities grant from the Ohio Arts Council. The author of two books of poems, his most recent, Red Kimono, Yellow Barn, awarded him the Ohio Poet of the Year in 2006. With photographer Gary Harwood he is the author of the documentary book, Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community, which received the Ohioana Book Award, the Carter G. Woodson Honor Book Award, and was a Finalist for the Great Lakes Book Award. With Maggie Anderson, he is co-editor of Learning by Heart: Contemporary American Poetry about School and After the Bell: Contemporary American Prose about School. His poems and essays have appeared in Prairie Schooner, The Sun, DoubleTake/Points of Entry, Indiana Review,and other journals. And we will have to check if he, in fact, was one of the first line readers for this year's book contest. If he was......oh yeah. No grudges.

Our other reader is about to make her journey into life, by leaving us all behind....but as long she is happy (sigh), we won't hold it against her. Michelle Krivanek has been reading around the local scene at open mics and warehouse salons as she finished her BA in English from CSU. She has won the top prize in CSU's annual creative writing contest not once, but three times in a row! Michelle is abandoning Cleveland to pursue an MFA at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco. We will resent not seeing her pedal about Tremont anymore and though she claims she can kick your ass, I'll be waiting for the opportunity to see if she can prove it with me, the betraying b.... Oh wait, ah no grudges.

So come to the Literary Cafe to see and hear these two talented poets, even though they don't deserve it for treating me so poorly. I'll be waving my rejection letter around while pouting in the corner. That should be entertaining. The Literary Cafe is located at 1031 Literary Road in the unforgiving neighborhood of Tremont in Cleveland.