The Studio Series Poetry Reading & Open Mic

Featuring John Miller and Diane Corson

 John Miller’s chapbooks Andes and Olympic were published by The Poetry Box in 2025 and 2022. His poetry was featured at the Elisabeth Jones Art Center’s Festival of Feelings and the Connecticut Poetry Festival. He has placed in the Oregon Poetry Association contests, and his poems have appeared in the anthology Opening the Gate and in the journals River Heron Review, Third Wednesday: A Literary & Arts Journal, West Trade Review and others. John is a founder and co-organizer of Portland Ars Poetica, a literary poetry collective whose events include generative and critical workshops, a book club and performances.

Diane Corson sees her poems and words floating on rivers, on waves, and hanging in trees. She was a featured poet at an event for the Portland Transit System and for several years served on the executive board of the Oregon Poetry Association. As a transplant to the Northwest she always wanted to live near the sea which she feels is her true home.

Diane’s poetry is in the collection of Oregon Poetry at the University of Oregon Library. She has been published in the Poetry Anthology, Theory Magazine, Territory Journal, the North Coast Squid, Cirque Journal, Terra Incognito, Pif Magazine, and pān dé mïk/2020: An Anthology of Pandemic Poems by OPA Members. She was also the featured artist and poet for Triggerfish Critical Review. Diane has written and designed three chapbooks: Poor Tree, Elemental, and There Being: Interiority.  Her latest book is Along the Fault of Me, available on the Ingram Spark website. She has an art and design degree from Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana, where she lived a fairly primitive life for thirty years before moving to the Pacific Northwest.

The Open Mic is open to all audience members. Participants can sign up before the start of the reading or during the break. In the interest of time, Open Mic readers are asked to limit their reading to three minutes.

View clips of featured poets reading at the Studio Series on Instagram @poet_landia and on our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/groups/1281329966139780/

The Ross Island Grocery and Café is a cozy space with capacity for 40 or so people. Tables are available, so people who arrive early can enjoy a light supper (i.e., a sandwich, salad or burger) while waiting for the reading to begin. If we run out of table space, folding chairs are available. A mic will enhance the readings. There is plenty of unrestricted parking on the streets around the Café.