Tonight: Free Poetry Reading at the Carriage House

Poets Donna Baier-Stein and Hank Kalet will read their works tonight at Fanwood's Patricia Kuran Cultural Arts Center, part of the free Carriage House Poetry Series. The performance starts at 8 p.m.

Baier-Stein, founding editor of the spiritual literature magazine Tiferet, will read about eight poems. Most will be selections from her upcoming poetry collection, she said, an as-yet unnamed project that focuses on Dorothy's adventure in The Wizard of Oz.

"I see her journey as a spiritual one," Baier-Stein said in a phone interview (all interviews for this piece were conducted by phone). "And I'm from Kansas/Missouri/Iowa and my mom's named Dorothy."

Whereas Baier-Stein's work is rooted in spirituality and surrealism, Kalet said he draws inspiration from Israli, Palestinian, Arab and Latin American poetry, as well as politically-minded rock music.

"Punk rock, Bruce Springsteen, the Beatles and Bob Dylan… [I] always loved rock lyrics," he said. "The first book of poems I bought was Carolyn Forche's The Country Between Us, a political work that has probably figured in my development more than I realize. That was 29 years ago."

Each reading will last about 20 minutes, said series founder and director Adele Kenny. For more information about the poets and the poetry series, visit the Carriage House Poetry Series blog.