Join us for a celebration of poetry!

At this friendly session, former New Westminster poet laureate, Alan Hill will host and guest poets, Jónina Kirton and Jessica McMillan will read from their work and answer any audience questions.
SUNDAY May 12, 2024 from 10;30 to 12:30
Located at New Westminster Public Library Main Branch – Downstairs Auditorium
716 6th Avenue New Westminster, BC, V3M 2B3
Link to event: https://www.nwpl.ca/events/poetic-justice/
More about the Bridges Festival here: https://www.nwpl.ca/events…/bridges-literary-festival/

The event will end with an open mic time for others to share their work. The open mic list (5 minutes each) will be available for sign up at the beginning of the event.

The event will be live in person and also livestreamed via Zoom. All registered attendees will receive the Zoom link a few days before the event. It will not be recorded.

About the Poets

.Jónína Kirton, a Red River Métis and Icelandic poet received the 2016 Vancouver’s Mayor’s Arts Award for an Emerging Artist in the Literary Arts category. Her second collection of poetry, An Honest Woman, was a finalist in the 2018 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize. She just released her third book, Standing in a River of Time.

Jessica Lee McMillan (she/her) is a poet and teacher with an English MA and creative writing certificate from SFU’s The Writer’s Studio. Her work has appeared in over 30 publications across Turtle Island including Crab Creek Review, The Humber Literary Review, Funicular, Pinhole Poetry, and Rose Garden Press. Jessica was a finalist for The Fiddlehead’s 2023 Ralph Gustafson Poetry Contest. She won the 2022 Royal City Literary Arts Society Write On! Contest for Poetry and has received poetry nominations for the Pushcart and Best of the Net. She lives on the land of the Halkomelem-speaking Peoples with her little family and large dog.

Alan Hill was born in the UK and immigrated to Canada in 2005. He is the former Poet Laureate of the City of New Westminster, BC (2017-2020), former president of the Royal City Literary Arts Society (RCLAS), and was the editor and curator of A Poetry of Place: Journeys Across New Westminster, published in partnership with New Westminster Arts Services. His writing has been published internationally and his poetry has appeared in Event, CV2, Canadian Literature, The Antigonish Review, subTerrain, Poetry is Dead, among others. He works in the field of community development and immigrant settlement and lives in New Westminster, BC. His book In The Blood, was published by Caitlin Press in 2022.

The Royal City Literary Arts Society’s mission is to maintain and build a welcoming community of writers and readers, to support the goals of writers at all stages of their development, and to promote an appreciation of all forms of literary arts. We are committed to building community capacity through the literary arts, promoting literacy, social connection and cross-cultural understanding and the central importance of the written and spoken word in community life.

May 9-12, 2024 | Various venues in New Westminster | Free admission
Welcome to the Bridges Literary Festival, New Westminster’s new festival of all things literary, bringing you stories of a river city. We are thrilled to launch the inaugural festival on the weekend of May 9th to 12th, presented by New Westminster Public Library in partnership with venues and organizations throughout the city.

There is a whole raft of free events for all ages to attend over the course of the weekend – author talks, poetry readings, kids’ storytimes, book launches, a local author book club, literary crafts, a critics circle, writing and creation workshops, and social events! All events are free, some are drop-in, but most require registration so we can plan for numbers.

Bridges Literary Festival is presented in collaboration with our partners: Arts New West, Groove Cat Books and Records, Kinder Books, Moodswing Coffee + Bar, New West Writers, Royal City Literary Arts Society, SFU Writer’s Studio, Steel & Oak Brewing Co., and Wildfires Bookshop.

Come. Read. Listen. Learn. Celebrate. Be inspired!