Brooklyn Poets Friday Night Open

Join us for the Brooklyn Poets Friday Night Open, which begins with an open mic and culminates in readings by two featured poets. Our featured poets on April 26th will be Raisa Tolchinsky & Tiffany Troy.

6:00 PM: open mic signup begins

6:30 to 7:45 PM: open mic

8 to 8:30 PM: featured readers

Each reader for the open mic can read for up to a four-minute set. Participants can purchase one of eight tickets in advance to reserve an open mic spot. Once those tickets sell out, all other participants who’d like to read for the open mic can purchase a ticket to sign up at the door on a first-come, first-serve basis. There will be time for about 16–18 readers.

Guests can purchase tickets to attend in person at 144 Montague Street or virtually via Zoom (note: virtual guests cannot read for the open mic). For in-person attendance, advance online ticket sales end at 5 PM on the day of the event. After that, tickets for in-person attendance can be purchased at the door until we reach capacity. Tickets for virtual attendance will be available until 6:30 PM. A Zoom link will be emailed to all ticket holders. Participants are encouraged to purchase tickets in advance for in-person attendance, as there are limited seats. Brooklyn Poets members take $5 off.

Note that by participating in the Friday Night Open, you agree to abide by our code of conduct and COVID-19 policy. Effective January 8, 2024, all events attendees except readers at a safe distance on stage are required to wear masks due to the current rise in cases in NYC. Our full policy can be found at the end of the event description. Brooklyn Poets reserves the right to dismiss from our programs any participant found to be in violation of these policies. Thank you for respecting our community.

Closed captions will be available for the event through the Zoom livestream. For more information and to request additional accommodations, contact us at bkp@brooklynpoets.org.

Featured Poets

Raisa Tolchinsky is the author of the poetry collection Glass Jaw (Persea Books, 2024), winner of the Lexi Rudnitsky First Book Prize in 2023. She has published poems in Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Michigan Quarterly Review and elsewhere. Raisa earned her MFA from the University of Virginia and her BA from Bowdoin College. She was the 2022–2023 George Bennett Writer-in-Residence at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire and is currently a student at Harvard Divinity School. Previously, Raisa lived in Chicago, Bologna (Italy) and New York City, where she trained as a boxer

Tiffany Troy is the author of Dominus (BlazeVOX [books]) and cotranslator of Santiago Acosta’s The Coming Desert / El próximo desierto (forthcoming, Alliteration Publishing House), in collaboration with Acosta and the 4W International Women Collective Translation Project at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She is the managing editor at Tupelo Quarterly, associate editor of Tupelo Press and book review coeditor at the Los Angeles Review.

COVID-19 Policy

Effective January 8, 2024, all events attendees are required to wear masks due to the current rise in cases in NYC. Masks will be available at the door.

We are implementing this change because, according to the latest data, we are in the second-largest surge in cases of the pandemic. The current metrics available, including NYC wastewater data and the CDC’s Respiratory Virus Activity Levels, both indicate very high levels of COVID and other illnesses that continue to increase.

While your personal risk tolerance may vary, the unmitigated spread of COVID disproportionately affects the most vulnerable in our community—including those who are immunocompromised or don’t have the privilege of taking paid sick days to heal and recover. We hope you’ll join us in taking the actions we can to make our space welcoming to all and to keep each other safe. Please stay home if you are experiencing symptoms, have a positive COVID test or someone close to you has recently tested positive.

While we do our best, Brooklyn Poets cannot guarantee zero risk. A risk of exposure to COVID-19 exists in all public settings. By entering the building, students, teachers and other attendees accept the risk of exposure and knowingly waive and release Brooklyn Poets from any liability related to COVID-19.

Brooklyn Poets Code of Conduct

Brooklyn Poets will not tolerate any instances of discrimination, harassment or abuse in conjunction with any of our programs. Respect and consideration for others, both within and outside our programs, are core values to be upheld by all participants. Discrimination against and/or harassment of community members on the basis of race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, disability, national origin, religion, age, marital status, veteran status or any other factor is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. Program participants are expected to adhere to all federal, state and local laws and regulations. Should a board or staff member, independent contractor, volunteer or program participant be found to violate any aspect of the organization’s code of conduct, Brooklyn Poets reserves the right to dismiss them from the program. Consequences may include, but not be limited to, dismissal from the current activity, suspension, ineligibility for all future activities, and/or loss of payment or fees. If you have any issues to report, please do not hesitate to contact Executive Director Jason Koo (koo@brooklynpoets.org) or Deputy Director r kay (kay@brooklynpoets.org), and they will get back to you as soon as possible.