Bards, Brews & Haiku to Be Held March 4 at the Central Library

WHAT: Bards, Brews & Haiku, featuring spoken poetry, beer, sake tasting, Japanese snacks
WHEN: Friday, March 4, 2016
WHERE: Central Library, Fiction Department
TIME: Music by Katie Lott starts at 6:30 p.m. and poetry performances begin at 7:00 p.m.

The Birmingham Public Library's popular Bards & Brews poetry performance/beer tasting series returns Friday, March 4, at the Central Library.

This Friday’s event, in a twist from traditional Bards & Brews, is being called Bards, Brews & Haiku. It will feature haiku readings and games, sake tasting and Japanese snacks, along with the usual performance poetry and beer sampling. The festivities start at 6:30 p.m. with live music by Katie Lott, beer tasting by Band of Brothers Brewing Company, sake tasting by Hop City, and light refreshments. The poetry begins to flow at 7:00 p.m. with Brian "Voice Porter" Hawkins serving as host with a short informative talk about haiku, led by Terri French of the Southeast chapter of the Haiku Society of America and Atlanta haiku poet Laurence Stacey.

French and Stacey will also lead a haiku workshop on Saturday, March 5, from 10 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., at the Central Library’s Story Castle on the second floor.

The official definition of haiku, according to the Haiku Society of America: A haiku is a short poem that uses imagistic language to convey the essence of an experience of nature or the season intuitively linked to the human condition. Most haiku in English consist of three unrhymed lines of seventeen or fewer syllables, with the middle line longest, though today's poets use a variety of line lengths and arrangements.

The event is made possible by grants from the Alabama State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Admission is free and open to the public; however, attendees must be at least 18 to enter and 21 to participate—ID is required. For more information, call 205-226-3670, email hm@bham.lib.al.us or visit the Bards & Brews Facebook page, or www.bplonline.org/bardsbrews.