The 2025 Massachusetts Poetry Festival

From Great White Shark to Jagged Ambush Bug, from Ladyslipper Orchid to Piping Plover, from Red Fox to Box Turtle, let’s celebrate the more-than-human beings we share New England’s shores, woods, and rivers with. The poems and being stories shared here are part of the forthcoming CAPE COD TO NOVA SCOTIA: ART, ECOLOGY, POETRY OF THE GULF OF MAINE (Storey Press, 2027) co-created by Samaa Abdurraqib, Elizabeth Bradfield, and Ian Ramsey. This “Feel Guide” will include work by Anne Sexton and Robert Lowell as well as newly-written poems by writers with ties to the region, such as Porsha Olayiwola, Chen Chen, Anna V. Q. Ross, and more. The Gulf of Maine includes cities like Boston and Portland, parks like the Cape Cod National Seashore and Acadia, and countless other wonders. Join us in a celebration of this beautiful ecoregion and the ways that poetry can give voice to the wonders of science and connection.