05/03/2026
Some evenings stay with you. On April 30 at Meetinghouse Arts in Freeport, the room held three decades of Maine's Poet Laureate tradition.
Together on the same stage for the first time were Maine Poets Laureate Betsy Sholl, Wesley McNair, Stuart Kestenbaum, the current Maine Poet Laureate Julia Bouwsma and Maine Poet Laureate Elect Dawn Potter (who will assume the role in July 2026). Kate Barnes and Baron Wormser were honored with a candle lighting and readings of their work.
The poems carried us through marriage and grief, rhubarb and beauty salons. A letter to a Maine still one hundred years away. Cow faces pressed to farmhouse screens, the moon compared to a deadbeat roommate and a violinist who played through her own brain surgery.
In the conversation which followed, Betsy Sholl told us about the poetry teacher who refused to give her permission or take it away. When she asked him, "Can I write?" he said, "I don't know. Can you? Don't ever give that power to anyone else."
This evening was a shared dream of Khristina Kurasz of the Maine Arts Commission and Freeport Folio Co-founder Jonas Werner. It was brought to life by the Maine Arts Commission, Freeport Folio, Gibson Fay-LeBlanc of the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance, Professor Noel Thistle Tague of the University of Maine at Augusta and Maya Williams, former Portland Poet Laureate and 2025-2026 Maine Poetry Out Loud Coordinator.
The recording is now on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_51i0rCd2c Skip to any poet in the description on YouTube.
With thanks to:
Event Sponsor: Kennebec Savings Bank
Media Sponsor: Down East Magazine
Venue Sponsor: Meetinghouse Arts
Special thanks to Tom Pierce and the team at the Town of Freeport’s TV3 for filming, live streaming and brilliantly editing the event video.
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Note: Recording of the event was lightly edited for content.
