Event Description

Join us for a reading and conversation with Philip Clark, co-editor of Invisible History: The Collected Poems of Walta Borawski.

Winner of the 2023 Thom Gunn Award for Gay Poetry, the poems in Invisible History tell stories from the life of Walta Borawski, a widely published writer active in the Boston and national scenes from the 1970s until his death from AIDS in 1994. Sexy, funny, thoughtful, and passionate, Borawski is the poet for people who never thought they’d love a poetry reading, the man who proudly proclaimed, “Drag queens, flowers, and women / who sing are still the fulcrum / of my teeter-totter.”

Praise for the poems of Walta Borawski:

“The poems are truthful, snappy, plenty of low life & local detail, sparky mind of the young poet sassing & observing his environment, gay & grim, still romantic. Who doesn’t love romance? Lots of intelligence in the line, mindful measure of spoken speech music.” — Allen Ginsberg, author of “Howl”

“Whether he’s writing about household objects, love, cruising, or Barbra Streisand, Walta Borawski’s voice is fresh, commanding, irresistible. To read him is to appreciate a levity that is rooted in seriousness; like that of the torch singers he celebrates in his poetry, Borawski’s is the kind of charisma that emerges from real feeling.” — Jack Parlett, author of Fire Island: A Century in the Life of an American Paradise

“Walta Borawski could be as witty and sly as Frank O’Hara, but he was wiser, more passionate, naked and liberated. The poems he left behind are a gift.” — Christopher Bram, author of Gods & Monsters

Invisible History: The Collected Poems of Walta Borawski