On October 12th, 13th, & 14th, small press poets from all over North America descended upon Kansas City to read poetry, sell poetry books, and enjoy all that KC has to offer. What used to go by the moniker of “The Kansas City Poetry Throwdown” (cf. https://jasonpreu.wordpress.com/2016/04/19/some-of-the-writers-from-this-weekends-poetry-throwdown/ & https://www.facebook.com/pg/Fountainverse/videos), was this year rebranded with a new mission to focus on small presses publishing poetry.

In attendance were:

Outlandish Press (Cleveland, OH)

Spartan Press (Belle, MO)

Epic Rites Press (Alberta, Canada)

Aztlan Libre Press (San Antonio, TX)

Write Bloody Publishing (Los Angeles, CA)

CWP Collective Press (Buffalo, NY)

Additional, there were many representatives from Kansas City area poetry organizations & events, such as Kansas City Poetry Slam, The Riverfront Reading Series, and the Latino Writers Collective.

We partnered this year with Kansas City’s Charlotte Street Foundation and their help and support pushed us into new levels of what we could provide attendees and audiences.

The team that puts this event on is made up of Jeannette Powers, Samantha Slupski, Brandon Whitehead, and me.

I encourage any and all small poetry presses out there reading this to reach out to us (https://www.fountainverse.com) and make plans to attend next year. I can’t emphasize enough how much collaboration and cross-city pollination occurs every year after we put one of this events together. Even if you are not selected as a featured press/reader, there are plenty of opportunities for you to present and perform and sell your work.