02/27/2026
THE FRIEND OF THE WORD AWARD:
Each year, the Poetry Room honors a member of our community, who exemplifies poetry as an ethic, who contributes to the well-being of the People, and who fosters and activates the best parts of our art-form: its capacity to question; to tend and attend; to make space for strangers and other angels in disguise---someone who attempts (as this year’s recipient has relentlessly, tirelessly) at every turn to contribute to what Stein calls “the Composition in which we live....”
I speak of course of the one and only Michael Franco, great poet, artist, and curator of two major Boston-area reading series (or what he calls “Oral Magazines”): The Word of Mouth series and the Xit the Bear series at the Press Room.
Over the years, Michael has generously used his own funds (even saving up his own tips as a waiter, in days of yore) to host readings by: Robin Bl**er, Bill Corbett, Robert Creeley, Kenward Elmslie, Diane DiPrima, F***y Howe, Ken Irby, Gerrit Lansing, Danielle Legros Georges, Nathaniel Mackey, David Rattray, Anne Waldman, Carol Weston, and folks in this room (and living among us now): including such poets as Dan Bouchard, Amanda and James Cook, Jim Dunn, Peter Gizzi, John Mulrooney, Patrick Pritchett, K. Prevallet, Chloe Garcia Roberts, and the list goes on….
And, I should add that he has (in this Curator’s time of need) offered every manner of tender mercy, every possible hospitality.
Michael has, in sum, created an epicenter of literary activity and of curiosity and care in the Boston area. And, he has been utterly egoless and quiet in the act—like “a great Fullerian trim-tab quietly changing the direction of Everything….”
Please lift up your hands for Michael Franco!
(This award was conferred on MIchael Franco at last night's Boston Originals reading).
