Image from Selina Trepp's animation Nowhere Now Here.

Power Lines 25th Anniversary Celebration

| 11:00 PM - 5:00 AM

Celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Tia Chucha Press anthology Power Lines, a democratic assemblage of Chicago’s slam poets and poets of letters at the dawn of the new millennium. In a blast from the past, local and notable contributors revisit their original poems from the anthology and offer new poems and insight 25years later. 

Featured poets include Ana Castillo, Andrea Change, Reginald Gibbons, Illinois Poet Laureate and Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize recipient Angela Jackson, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Tyehimba Jess, Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize recipient Haki R. Madhubuti, Muench, Mark Turcotte, Cin Salach, and anthology editors Julie Parson Nesbitt, Luis Rodriguez, and Michael Warr.

“As long as there is a search for a primal link to people, for solutions to social equations, and for that way of saying what can not be said in ordinary language, poetry will remain the people’s means of expression.” 

—Michael Warr, Introduction to Power Lines

Power lines from the poets: 
quoteRight
The President’s elevator does not go
all the way to the
top.
quoteLeft
— Angela Jackson
quoteRight
learn to live in the space
between your
breaths
quoteLeft
— Tyehimba Jess

This program is presented in partnership with the Poetry Center and The Guild Literary Complex. It is part of the Poetry Foundation’s spring 2025 season, Power Lines

Additional Information

  • All Poetry Foundation events are completely free of charge and open to the public.
  • Advanced registration is encouraged.
  • The performance space is ADA-compliant and wheelchair-accessible.
  • The program will feature CART captioning and ASL interpretation.

For more information about accessibility at the Poetry Foundation, please visit our Accessibility Guide.

Know Before You Go

Library Group GIF 1920x1080

Hours

Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday: 11 AM–5 PM
Thursday: 11 AM–6 PM
Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday: Closed

More Information