Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Trident Author Series

Alison Hawthorne Deming

Tuesday April 15 - 6:30PM-7:30PM

BLUE FLAX & YELLOW MUSTARD FLOWER

&

THE GIFT OF ANIMALS

About Alison:

Poet, essayist, and editor Alison Hawthorne Deming, grew up in New England, steeped in literary and naturalist traditions. Recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, she has published six books of poetry and five books of nonfiction, with two books out in 2025: the poetry collection Blue Flax & Yellow Mustard Flower (Red Hen Press) and the anthology The Gift of Animals: Poems of Love, Loss, & Connection (Storey Press). She coedited with Lauret E. Savoy the anthology The Colors of Nature: Culture, Identity, and the Natural World. She served as Poet-in-Residence at the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens for the Language of Conservation; and the Milwaukee Public Museum and Milwaukee Public Library for Field Work, both projects sponsored by Poet’s House in NYC. Her other awards include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Borchard Foundation, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Stegner Fellowship from Stanford University, and Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets. She is former Agnese Nelms Haury Chair in Environment and Social Justice and former Director of the UA Poetry Center. Currently she is Regents Professor Emerita at the University of Arizona. She lives in Tucson, Arizona and Grand Manan, New Brunswick, Canada.

New Books:

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR NEW BOOKS BY ALISON HAWTHORNE DEMING

BLUE FLAX & YELLOW MUSTARD FLOWER, Red Hen Press, (Pub date, March 4th 2025)

“Alison Hawthorne Deming’s new collection, Blue Flax & Yellow Mustard Flower is a rich catalog of the Anthropocene, including history, research, and initiative. In the tradition of Rachel Carson, Annie Dillard, and Pattiann Rogers––Deming pays extraordinary attention to the natural world. With skillful use of scientific detail, music, place, and the power of naming things, she sounds an alarm and a call to action. Moving deftly from the short lyric to the long narrative to prose: “each word an act / of defiance against the unspeakable.” Poem after poem reads like a “little locus of beauty to counter the decay.” This collection is an homage to naturalists and explorers, to environmental consciousness, to curiosity and to service––it is a lyric acknowledgement of the delicate balance of life.” --Ellen Bass

“Alison Hawthorne Deming is not a poet for whom environmental writing is merely a subject or an aspect of her brand.  For this true poet, nature is nothing less than a beyond-one’s-own-life existential presence.  As with Merwin, Snyder, and Hillman, I read Deming’s complex work both for its powerful engagements with nature and the vivifying inventions of its music.  Blue Flax & Yellow Mustard Flower provides us such abundance: vigilance but also awe, documentation alongside discovery, and formal designs that range from quantitative syllabics to the open fields of free verse and prose poetry.  In the end Deming’s artful strategies are—as in areas as diverse as physics, sociobiology, and grammar—deeply relational.  Each “chatter, dirge, thesis, and psalm” is what it is in vital symbiosis with the rest.” --David Baker 

THE GIFT OF ANIMALS, Storey Press (Pub Date, April 1st )

The Gift of Animals is a wonderful book, the rare treasure that you will want to give to all your friends, even as you keep a copy close beside you. Brilliantly selected and meaningfully arranged, the poems unfold one after another – perfectly observed, rambunctious, hilarious or heartbreaking, astonishing, revelatory or mysterious, loving. In our cosmic loneliness, the company of animals is a great gift that asks in return only that we notice them, respect them, keep a safe place for them on Earth. The poetry of The Gift of Animals is a beautiful invitation to that moral relationship.   — Kathleen Dean Moore, author Earth’s Wild Music

The Gift of Animals offers us a fascinating treasure trove of the most surprising (re)connections to oysters, flamingoes, snakes, and a whole lyrical host of other dazzling heartbeats that beat the same as ours, no matter how many chambers. This collection of fins, fur, scales, and wings echoes a most satisfying call back to our mutual, extraordinary home: Earth.  –Aimee Nezhukumatathil 

This gorgeous collection of encounters feels like an antidote to species loneliness, providing a multifaceted lens on our desire for communion with the more-than-human world. --Robin Wall Kimmerer

And Now...Featuring: is a monthly variety show that features local artists of all kinds. Poets, Music makers, Comedians, Dancers, Performance Artists...

Come early for the open jam session from 6-6:30pm (bring an instrument, borrow one!)

Then, stay for the Variety Show from 6:30-8!

Hosted by Aimee Herman

For more info or to feature for an upcoming month, email: aimeeherman@gmail.com

Moonlight Bloom is a psychedelic rock trio hailing from Denver, Colorado. With a blend of searing riffs and lush sensitivities, the group is sure to tickle ALL the bits of its entranced listeners.

"A lot of the time, there may not be a solution to love, but at the very least, there can be consolation. The local jazz quartet, Chromatic Consolation, formed in the summer of 2024, is here to bring their soulful interpretations of love to Trident. From ’20s swing to ’90s soul and modern jazz, ballads to disco, and blues to bossa, there’re definitely melodies that will make you groove into the tenderness of a sweet evening."

http://www.youtube.com/@ChromaticConsolation

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Join members of the Boulder Police Oversight Panel for an open and honest community conversation to discuss policing in Boulder. This is an opportunity to share your thoughts, ask questions, and engage in meaningful dialogue about public safety and accountability in our city. The event will take place at Trident Café, 940 Pearl St., Boulder, CO, on Tuesday April 22nd, 2025 from 6:30PM to 8:00 PM. All community members are welcome so come be part of the conversation!

Sign Up at 5:30

Penelope is a mandolinist, singer, and songwriter. She plays primarily folk and bluegrass music and is influenced by artists like Sarah Jarosz and Sierra Hull. Her musical journey has been shaped by growing up going to Planet Bluegrass' Rockygrass Academy & festivals, musical theater, school choir, vocal and mandolin lessons, and jamming with family and friends. Penelope heads to Berklee College of Music for mandolin performance in fall of 2025.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Author Bio: 

Nathan Alexander Moore is a writer, cultural theorist, and educator. She is an assistant professor at the University of Colorado Boulder whose research explores Black transfemininity, speculative fictions and temporality. Their poetry chapbook, small colossus, was published in 2021 by above/ground press. Their fiction was a Semifinalist for the 2021 Screencraft Cinematic Book Competition, as well as shortlisted for the 2022 Santa Fe Writers Project Literary Award. She was also a 2023 Lambda Literary Fellow in poetry. The Rupture Files is their fiction debut.

About the Book:

Across multiple worlds in upheaval, a curious cast of Black queer characters must choose between what they already know themselves to be and what they might yet become in the cataclysm. A shapeshifter learns to embrace their body as it changes through a lunar cycle. A stranger’s visit disturbs three sisters sheltering from monsters that stalk the land. An archivist hears an irresistible call to the rising ocean as she uncovers a surprising history. A mysterious fire sparks whispers of revolution in the mind of a vampire’s captive consort.

At once tender and audacious, Nathan Alexander Moore’s debut collection tells the stories of extraordinary creatures making impossible but human decisions. Traversing apocalypses both big and small, these captivating tales vibrate with the tensions between loss and growth; self and community; precarity and possibility.

Bring an acoustic instrument and sit in with Boulder Old-Time Jam! Every first Thursday on the Trident Patio, starting at 6 p.m.

Trouble’s Braids is a musical duo from Colorado’s Front Range that creates dynamic folk music with teeth. They have been featured artists at Rock Inn Estes Park, Bricks on Main, Bootstrap Brewing, Gold Hill, Laughing Goat, St. Julien Hotel, Bread Bar, Roots Music Project, and many others.

Trouble’s Braids combines poignant lyricism, rich female and male harmonies, and great hooks with an unflinching curiosity about the dark and hidden corners of the human experience, all with a wink and a nod that invites the audience to come play.

Their influences are broad and deep, drawing inspiration from classic songwriters like Bob Dylan, John Prine, and Lucinda Williams, as well as more contemporary acts like Big Thief, Mitski, The Decemberists, The Mountain Goats, PJ Harvey, Tom Waits and Nick Cave.

Colorado’s blues duo Hundred Pound Housecat packs plenty of punch.  Their sound is a foot-stomping mix of original blues and soulful Americana that feels like it is simultaneously from another time and perfect for this one.

Melly Frances’ vocals are incomparable.  She sounds like a beautiful, eerie Bessie Smith 78 one minute, before letting out a ragged scream that would make Leon Russel blush, the next.  She does all of this while holding down the rhythm with a mix of bass, washboard and stomp box.  Keke Lee punctuates Housecat’s music with a mix of slide and piedmont blues guitar, reminiscent of Tampa Red, Memphis Minnie and Johnny Shines.

The Niwot Gig Rocks the Trident

Sunday, May 4, 2025
2PM-4PM
Trident Booksellers & Cafe

The Niwot Gig, a local rock and pop music school, will feature four youth rock bands. The bands will perform classics and current hits including Noah Kahun, Radiohead, White Stripe, Van Halen, and Ramones.The members of The Night Owls, Friday Fire, Splinter, and Burnt Bananas are between the ages of 10-15. 

www.theniwotgig.com

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

About Mother Self:
The Mother Self is a collection of poetry that poignantly unveils the journey of a new mother navigating the complexities of early motherhood. Accessible and engaging, each poem captures a mother's delicate dance as she embraces her new identity and grieves her past self, all while finding solace in the sacred bond with her son. Readers are invited to explore the beauty and challenges of this period of life with grace and authenticity and to linger in the quiet spaces of a mother’s heart, where love and loss intertwine, and a meaningful journey of growth unfolds.
Above all, this book is a poetic testimony to every incomparable and holy step of motherhood.

About Talia Gutin:
Talia Gutin is a writer, certified Life Coach (PCC), and mother. She received her master’s degree from New York University, where she studied psychology and creative writing, combining her love of language with a deep curiosity for the human psyche. She is the lead coach at Mindful Marriage and Family Therapy, based in New York City, where she guides individuals and couples on their paths to emotional and mental wellness. Talia lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her husband and two children

Empowered Travel: "You are most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were." — Unknown

After eight sabbaticals (including a 1.5 years in Latin America, 4 months in SE Asia and China, 5 months between Nepal and India, 1 month in Norway, 3 months in the Balkans and Greece, and 1 month between Armenia, Georgia, Croatia and Slovenia), exploring over seventy countries (and living in ten, including Mexico, UK, Argentina, and Slovenia), and venturing on four long-haul bike tours—from Cuba to China, the Balkans to Southeast Asia—I’ve learned that true transformation happens in the in-between spaces.

It’s in hiking solo through the Alps and the Himalayas, in volunteering across Laos, Poland, Argentina, and Nepal, hitchhiking through thirteen Latin American countries, and in navigating both breathtaking landscapes and life’s toughest transitions that I’ve come to understand what real empowerment means.

My path has woven through international tourism leadership, including my role as Director of Partnerships at The Transformational Travel Council, Brand Ambassador at Synergy - The Retreat Show and Women Travel Leaders, or Adventure Travel Lead at Connections Way. It has also taken me through deep personal challenges—depression, the absence of a father figure, addictions, and self-image struggles—as well as transformative experiences like Vipassana silent retreats (Vipassana Meditation), shamanic workshops (Tu i Teraz), and intensive studies in Japanese Psychology (ToDo Institute), Regenerative Leadership (Regenerators), and Transformation Design. Each experience, whether on the road or within, has shaped not only who I am today but also the foundation of our company.

I founded empowered.travel to help women navigate life transitions with courage and clarity—without sacrificing their wellbeing. Because transformation isn’t just about where you go; it’s about who you become along the way.

Join me on this journey by attending our 2-hr complimentary sabbatical workshop. Let’s create a life of adventure, meaning, and purpose-driven action—together.

Our website: https://empowered.travel

Our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/empowered.travel/ 

Our brand video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhfHedNkqWw 

Jazz + poetry form the roots of the word but fail to capture the life of the event. Original words composed by local writers are spoken live over completely improvised music. What the poets bring to the mic varies as much as the musical styles and soundscapes explored. The band is Von Disco: an local trio that blends hip hop, neo-soul, and evolving sonic atmospheres. They have provided the backbone of Jazzetry since its inception in 2015, and the event continues to be an adventure for all involved.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

In this groundbreaking book, Khara Croswaite Brindle and Hannah DeGroot explore how the Enneagram informs money beliefs and behaviors as they relate to your relationship with money. Broken up into three parts, they begin with looking at money challenges for underearners and professionals. Next, they look at each of the nine Enneagram types as they relate to relational and individual challenges with money. Finally, they provide simple tools for increasing money flow in your personal and professional life from the lens of financial therapy. This is the definitive book on the intersection between the Enneagram and money.

About Khara:

Khara is the published author of nine books who is passionate about turning pain points into possibilities. This means she loves talking about topics others wish to avoid, like leadership trauma, client suicide, and money shame. As a Social Enneagram Type Three Wing Two, perfectionist, certified financial therapist and serial entrepreneur who specializes in working with helping professionals, she is the co-author of the book Your Enneagram and Money: Transforming Enneagram Edges into Financial Freedom

About Hannah:

Hannah is a Licensed Professional Counselor, Certified Enneagram Coach, Executive Coach and co-author of the book Your Enneagram and Money: Transforming Enneagram Edges into Financial Freedom. In her practice, she uses the Enneagram to help individuals find passion, motivation, and fulfillment in their personal and professional lives.  

And Now...Featuring: is a monthly variety show that features local artists of all kinds. Poets, Music makers, Comedians, Dancers, Performance Artists...

Come early for the open jam session from 6-6:30pm (bring an instrument, borrow one!)

Then, stay for the Variety Show from 6:30-8!

Hosted by Aimee Herman

For more info or to feature for an upcoming month, email: aimeeherman@gmail.com

Originally from Salida Colorado, The Sanct is your oasis of good vibes and bodacious jams. This power trio specializes in soulful originals and classic rock covers that will make you say “hell yeah”

With humble roots in an unheated backyard shed, Boulder-based Jehovah’s Fitness Club brings an eclectic mix of jazz, funk, blues and Latin sounds to the local scene. With eight exceptional musicians at its core, JFC has a proven track record of putting on a lighthearted and energetic show, drawing crowds in local venues like BOCO cider and the South Boulder Speakeasy. Known for their seamless improvisation and tight musical synergy, they effortlessly blend spontaneity and groove, creating a unique live experience every time they take the stage. JFC’s new EP, Household Name, released this Spring.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Tuesday May 20th at 630PM

About Aspen:

As a full-time parent first and a writer as often as life allows, Aspen Everett is haunted by the casualties of modernity. Creating what they call Heathen Mythologies, Aspen hopes to return readers to reverence for the More-than-Human by creating new myths of mutualism. Aspen is the author of Tributaries, available from Middle Creek Publishing, an instructor with Lighthouse Writers, and chair of Geopoetics with Beyond Academia Free Skool. They live in Boulder, Colorado with their sixteen-year-old, beneath the shadow of Mt. Arapaho.

About Tributaries:

“Tributaries” is a pulse, a heartbeat of imprinted memories found within the land we all find ourselves in. Listen closely to the language of tree bark, owl howls, bison, coyotes, butterfly dreams. An eco-poetic journey that digs into the humanity and spirituality of nature and the one who travels its paths. As Everett writes, “My body is a land of limestone/karstic, hollow, just as malleable,/a living structure where the dead/carve their initials.” This is an encapsulation of what we swallow: animalia, hallucinogens, ancestral pain, all the maps we carry as we move on. It is a body nurtured by the trees, the mountains, and all the bodies of water. This collection is a tribute to the sounds and shifts that we sometimes forget to notice, and a testament to what transforms when we (finally) pay attention.

—Aimee Herman, author of Meant to Wake Up Feeling and To Go Without Blinking

About Sage:

Sage Marshall is a poet, essayist, and outdoors journalist from southwest Colorado. He has lived across the U.S. and currently resides in Western Montana. Marshall is a contributing writer and former editor of Field & Stream. His creative work has been featured in publications such as The Missouri Review, Sport Literate, swamp pink, and elsewhere. Echolocation (Middle Creek Publishing and Audio), his debut poetry collection, weaves the landscapes and ecologies of the American West against themes of violence, adolescence, and beauty. Check out more of his writing and drop him a line at www.SageMarshall.com.

About Echolocation:

"In this series, the body and the landscape are one. The night as well as our bodies are bruised; the fire on the hillside, which is watched like a drive-in movie, ends with ash in our mouths; the forgiveness we have swallowed turns to swallows bursting from deep thickets of grass. This is poetic echolocation. This is a sacred call and response between a writer and all the environments he inhabits."

—Alexander Shalom Joseph, author of Our Mother, The Mountain and Broken Light in a Burning Wood


"In Echolocation, Sage Marshall has crafted poems of brilliant reflection, finding his way through questions we all must ask of coming into our own, even when answers can be held but briefly. Marshall’s poems are vulnerable and inspired, acutely aware of both the beauty we inherit of the world and the pain we inflict on ourselves and others. This is a remarkable debut."

—Erin Block, Author of How You Walk Alone in the Dark, winner of the Colorado Book Award


"Tough and bloody, full of the grit of real life, of lives lived close to the land, lives lived in struggle and brotherly competition and the great stakes of father and son relationships, Sage Marshall’s debut, Echolocation, still manages to be a book of deep tenderness, of love and honor and the wisdom of hard years and the natural world."

—Joe Wilkins, author of Thieve and When We Were Birds, winner of the of the Oregon Book Award

"Traversing the vastness of your mind on noise-powered vessels: Mind Maps is a psychedelic noisepunk band out of Boulder, CO, formed in 2024."

One fiddle, one guitar, one friendship—that’s all you need. At least, that’s what Colorado’s own Trace & Baerd demonstrate. They write songs that sound like memories—wordlessly weaving together strands of Celtic, Americana, Scandinavian, Bluegrass, Jazz, and Magic to create something new and yet deeply familiar. Elevation, their all-original debut album produced by Punch Brothers’ own Brittany Haas, is a celebration of honesty, spontaneity, and sincerity. It pairs best with your morning coffee, your afternoon walk, or your long drive home. Lush, stark, calming, uplifting, surprising and familiar, the music of Trace & Baerd is what it sounds like to set off on a journey with a friend by your side.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

About Rabbit Moon:

Four years after their bitter divorce, Claire and Aaron Litvak get a phone call no parent is prepared for: their 22-year-old daughter Lindsey, teaching English in China during a college gap year, has been critically injured in a hit and run accident. At a Shanghai hospital they wait at her bedside, hoping for the best and preparing for the worst. 
 
The accident unearths a deeper fissure in the family: the shocking event that ended the Litvaks’ marriage and turned Lindsey against them. Estranged from her parents, she has confided only in her younger sister, Grace, adopted as an infant from China. As Claire and Aaron struggle to get their bearings in bustling, cosmopolitan Shanghai, the newly prosperous “miracle city,” they face troubling questions about Lindsey’s life there, in which nothing is quite as it seems.
 
With Jennifer Haigh’s trademark psychological acuity, Rabbit Moon is a taut, suspenseful story about the ties of marriage that no divorce can sever, and the fabled red thread that pulls two sisters together across time and space. Haigh proves yet again that she is "an expertly nuanced storyteller…her work is gripping, real, and totally immersive" (New York Times).

About Jennifer Haigh:

Jennifer Haigh is the author of seven best-selling, critically acclaimed works of fiction. Her first, Mrs. Kimble, won the PEN Hemingway Award for debut fiction. Her latest, Mercy Street, was named a Best Book of 2022 by the New Yorker and won the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award. A Guggenheim fellow and graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, she lives in Boston.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Trident Book Series

The Great Gatsby at 100

Hosted by James Vacca

James Vacca is a retired Boulder High school teacher who has taught the Great Gatsby for twenty years and still discovers new insights with each yearly re-reading.  On this 100th anniversary of the publishing of the novel, the parallels from 1925 to 2025 are arresting. He believes enduring literature may provide a road map for our own troubled times. Gatsby is an American Rorschach as we read it we see ourselves. Join James for a conversation about the myth of American aspiration and examine historical artifacts, letters, first editions, magazines and other memorabilia  from the Roaring Twenties that have their own story to tell.

Bring an acoustic instrument and sit in with Boulder Old-Time Jam! Every first Thursday on the Trident Patio, starting at 6 p.m.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

About Amie:

Amie Whittemore (she/her) is the author of three poetry collections, most recently Nest of Matches (Autumn House Press). Her chapbook, Hesitation Waltz, is forthcoming from the Midwest Writing Center. She was the 2020-2021 Poet Laureate of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and an Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow. Her poems have won multiple awards, including a Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Prize, and her writing has appeared in Blackbird, Colorado Review, Terrain.org, Pleiades, and elsewhere. She teaches creative writing at Eastern Illinois University.

About Nest of Matches:

Amie Whittemore’s Nest of Matches is a lavish declaration of the beauty of the natural world, queer identity, and of the imagination set free. Whittemore’s third collection explores the complexities of love—romantic, familial, and love for place—and wonders at cycles of life, finding that: “Every habit / even love—strangest / of them all—offers exhaustion / and renewal.” Moving seamlessly from meditations on the moon’s phases to explorations of dream spaces to searches for meaning through patterns of love and loss, Whittemore’s work embodies the mysteries of dichotomies—grief and joy, consciousness and unconsciousness, habit and spontaneity—and how they coexist to create our identities. Throughout the collection, Whittemore reveals how interior nature manifests into exterior habits and how physical landscapes shape the psyche.

NectarMoth is the musical project of vocalist and songwriter Sara Kaiser, whose evocative lyricism and atmospheric sound weave together elements of folk, Celtic, and cinematic composition. Her music moves dynamically between the intimate and the expansive, speaking to your soul, your dreams, and our time together on this vulnerable Earth. Collaboration with world-class cellist Shaun Diaz adds an even deeper dimension of artistry and emotion to her performances. After seven beloved years of rural life in the Eastern Sierra, she is now based in Colorado, where she is delighted to explore the spectra of lived experience through song and story with you.

Founded in 2018 by college roommates Tess Condron and Rylee Dunn, Blankslate was formed around the principle of transformation; a belief in the possibility to become. By culling elements of disparate influences ranging from folks to grunge to classic rock, the band has spent its six-year existence earning fans in Colorado and beyond with a uniquely crafted sound that serves as a tapestry upon which referential, diaristic lyrics and stories are interwoven. Blankslate's debut album, 'Summer on a Salt Flat,' received rave reviews when it was released in 2022 — their follow up, 'Lookout Mountain Charley,' is set to come out this year. 

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

About Mountain Time: A Field Guide to Astonishment:

In Mountain Time, Renata Golden writes that mountains create a “constant hum” connecting the very core of the earth to our own skin.  She interweaves stories from her own life with riveting accounts about the Apache and Irish, yucca and Lehmann’s love grass, kangaroo rats and leopard frogs who have made a home somewhere and sometime in the complex topography of the southwestern borderland she loves. Golden’s gorgeous, instructive collection is the guidebook we need now. 

—Camille T. Dungy, author of Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden

"Golden unites nature and humankind into a breathtaking, give-and-take dance, transporting readers from immigrant stories and insightful explorations of displaced Indigenous peoples to considerations of the animals at her doorstep, all connected by threads of love and respect."
—Publishers Weekly

Renata Golden’s Mountain Time: A Field Guide to Astonishment would be at home with Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, or Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire. Or, best, with Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass, for humility and listening and deep awareness of multiple stories and voices. But these gemlike sentences are Golden’s own, and they woo me into an affair with a place I’ve never been. Fierce and beguiling, funny and brave, this is a book about love: how to love a place where you find yourself a visitor, and how to love the life you’ve won for yourself. 

—Joni Tevis, author of The World Is On Fire

"With her thought-provoking debut essay collection, Mountain Time: A Field Guide to Astonishment, Renata Golden grounds us in place and explores transformative relationships with the human and nonhuman community of the Chiricahuas. Golden encounters longtime ranchers, prairie dogs, leopard frogs, snakes, bluebirds, ants, and a special greyhound. These transporting essays take us on journeys of thought and emotion, and will give you a new lens to see the world, and you'll be grateful for that."

—Sean Hill, author of Blood Ties & Brown Liquor and Dangerous Goods

In this luminous collection, Renata Golden offers us an un-easy love story: with birds and people, mountains and family, history and place. Elegantly researched and exquisitely crafted, these essays have a depth and range that will delight and, yes, astonish.

—Susan Fox Rogers, author of Learning the Birds, Editor of When Birds Are Near

"Everyone in America should read this book." 

—Lynn Cline, Cline's Corner radio show

About Renata Golden:

Renata Golden’s essay collection Mountain Time: A Field Guide to Astonishment was published by CSU Press/UGA Press in March 2024 and is the winner of the 2024 Southwest Book Award. It also was a finalist for the New Mexico/Arizona Book Award and the River Teeth Nonfiction Contest. Individual essays have been finalists for literary awards including the Penelope Niven Creative Nonfiction Award, Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction, and Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University Award. Renata was awarded residencies at Storyknife in Alaska and Write on, Door County and currently serves as reviews editor and board member for Terrain.org. She earned an MFA in creative writing from the University of Houston. Originally from the South Side of Chicago, she now lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

And Now...Featuring: is a monthly variety show that features local artists of all kinds. Poets, Music makers, Comedians, Dancers, Performance Artists...

Come early for the open jam session from 6-6:30pm (bring an instrument, borrow one!)

Then, stay for the Variety Show from 6:30-8!

Hosted by Aimee Herman

For more info or to feature for an upcoming month, email: aimeeherman@gmail.com

Hailing from the lively music scene of Boulder, Colorado, Huck n’ Pray formed in fall

2023 through deep dorm jams and pop-up performances on campus. A shared love for Phish,

Grateful Dead, and King Gizzard united lead guitarist Cory Shishik with rhythm guitarist Fintan

Canning when they met on their first day of college. The two became inseparable and knew that they had to form a band, but were missing a rhythm section. The parking lot of a Phish concert is where the duo met drummer Axel Pearson, and the addition of bassist Will Berbaum completed the group’s lineup a short while later. 

Huck n’ Pray quickly picked up momentum in the Boulder music scene, playing a show at the iconic Fox Theatre as just their fourth gig as a band. They continued to grow a loyal fanbase in the front range area, before being invited to play at the prestigious Electric Honey and Coat Check “Circus” in December of 2024. The 500+ person festival acted as a springboard for Huck n’ Pray as they continued to pack venues like The Roots Music Project, The Fox Theatre, and countless local shows.

Huck n’ Pray has created a new and electrifying sound that they are eager to share with the world. With a new year underway and an Album in the works, the band plans to continue developing their genre-bending attack and captivating audiences with their eccentric live performances.​​ The band has got some really exciting things coming up–especially this summer–that you won’t wanna miss out on.

Jazz + poetry form the roots of the word but fail to capture the life of the event. Original words composed by local writers are spoken live over completely improvised music. What the poets bring to the mic varies as much as the musical styles and soundscapes explored. The band is Von Disco: an local trio that blends hip hop, neo-soul, and evolving sonic atmospheres. They have provided the backbone of Jazzetry since its inception in 2015, and the event continues to be an adventure for all involved.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

It's Always Been Me

Tuesday June 24th at 630PM

About It's Always Been Me:

For fans of Lily King and Jojo Moyes, a contemporary women’s novel about a woman navigating love, loss, and the whispering call of her neglected artistic dreams.

Right after Sabina watches her rock star husband walk out on their marriage, a phone call reveals that her beloved grandmother is in the ICU in Santa Cruz, CA. So, Sabina hits the road with a tear-stained face, a bad hangover, and no plan for her future.

After arriving, she rediscovers a number of old loves: ocean swimming, process painting, and a high school sweetheart named Graham—all of which force her to reckon with how she buried her dream of being an artist to support her husband. But strange things are afoot. Sabina hears a mysterious voice and wonders if it’s a Selkie, one of the mythical shape-shifting seal folk from her grandmother’s tales. The voice seems to be guiding her, but can she trust it?

While her marriage and her grandmother’s health deteriorate, Sabina returns to her painting asking big questions: Is it too late to live her dream? Must she choose between her dream and love? And is the voice she’s hearing a sign she’s lost it or a key to unlocking her true self?

About Megan Walrod:

Megan Walrod is a published author, women's empowerment coach, and founder of Live Your Yes. For over 16 years, she’s supported women to break free from their “good girl” conditioning and create bold, audacious lives. She’s currently living in Bali as a digital nomad. She has a thing for mermaids, cupcakes, and skinny dipping. It’s Always Been Me is her first novel.

Kirk Margoles is a singer-songwriter guitarist, based in Boulder, Colorado. He has performed at numerous venues in Colorado and also in Massachusetts and California as a solo artist, as part of the Margoles Duo and with the vocal duo "Kirk and Kate." His melodic, lyrically poetic and rhythmic songs explore themes of love, self realization, nature, and the wild spirit within us all. Notable influences include Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, Patti Smith, Mark Knopfler, John Lennon, and Gillian Welch. Inspired by folk, jazz, classical and rock, Kirk’s songs take the art of song into dynamic new dimensions.

http://www.youtube.com/@kmargoles

https://kirkmargoles.bandcamp.com/album/songs-from-the-fields-of-life

Jack and Emily Campbell

Colorado-based Jack Campbell & the Head Mess draws on the Minneapolis songwriting tradition of stuffing infectious pop earworms and unique harmonic flavors into a fuzzy garage rock package. Their danceable indie rock veneer, akin to influences such as Sondre Lerche, the Replacements, and Elvis Costello, conceals deeper themes of mental health and relationship struggles. This performance at Trident will feature the group's duo configuration with Emily Campbell on woodwinds and the addition of several special surprise instrumentalists.

Becca Hasselbrook

Musician and singer-songwriter Becca Hasselbrook has been composing for over 20 years. Her songs infuse creative melodies with piano-driven stylings, emphasizing texture and harmony. An avid listener of many styles of music, she draws on genres including alternative, jazz, folk, pop, and occasionally classical. Lyrically, she is reflective and poetic, at times personal, and often mystical. Becca is based in Westminster, CO and enjoys playing open mics and shows in the area.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Bring an acoustic instrument and sit in with Boulder Old-Time Jam! Every first Thursday on the Trident Patio, starting at 6 p.m.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

And Now...Featuring: is a monthly variety show that features local artists of all kinds. Poets, Music makers, Comedians, Dancers, Performance Artists...

Come early for the open jam session from 6-6:30pm (bring an instrument, borrow one!)

Then, stay for the Variety Show from 6:30-8!

Hosted by Aimee Herman

For more info or to feature for an upcoming month, email: aimeeherman@gmail.com

Amanda Crumley is a singer-songwriter who is re-emerging.  Equal parts Radiohead and Dolly Parton (among countless others) influence songs that are fully her own. After pursuing jazz in graduate school and a few years beyond, she established herself in Chicago as a songwriter, performer and bandleader. After releasing her second and final album with her former band, Mandy and the Bandits, sunnier days beckoned, and she moved to Los Angeles from where inspiration had been calling her.  Since then she has been quietly and consistently writing, and getting her sea legs as a solo performer.  Denver has proven to be fertile creative ground,  and she is now planning to record a new album of original music. Among the many threads of her music comes a new offering: self-acceptance.

Ben Tonak has been playing across Colorado and Wyoming for more than 20 years. In 2021, he released the full-length album "Places for Everything." He currently performs solo and with his live band as Ben Tonak and the Bad Fix. In 2024 he released the single "Halloween".  He has just released a new full-length album "To Believe" in February 2025.

Kate Grigsby (Katie Gee) grew up in Colorado and has played guitar and sang in several bands, including the Hollyfelds and Ben Tonak and The Bad Fix. She’s a neurospicy teacher, mom, and lover of animals, and occasionally has time to play music. 

A local musician with over 15-years of live performing experience specializing in modern acoustic guitar, utilizing my jazz and blues background. Over the past 25+ years, I've worked extensively to incorporate Colorado sounds to create dynamic arrangements and include them in originals and exciting covers. This work recently culminated in my first album, "Time's Possibilities," which I released in January.  

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Justin Bloss is an alternative/folk/americana singer songwriter based out of Tulsa, OK. Drawing inspiration mostly from literature, his songs read as dark poetry often telling stories of war, drugs, and nature's battle with humanity. A nearly twenty year career with limited releases, playing mostly small dives, 2024 has been a year of growth including multiple tours opening for John Moreland and American Aquarium, along with the release of an EP and full length album titled Claymore. A solo singer songwriter, devoted to the craft, refusing to leave anything unsaid. 

Jackson Cloud is an artist out of Boulder CO, with influences of many different genres including psychedelic rock, atmospheric/electronic, shoegaze and R&B. You will experience many different moods through Jackson's original material, now doing a solo act with guitar, synthesizers and a drum machine!

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

About Fallout:

Told in three points-of-view, with a nearly all-women “cast,” FALLOUT is a timely exploration of the power of women to radicalize for a just cause against forces of opposition.

Journalist Justine Goodman’s professional interest has turned to obsession with Project Nemesis—an all-women group of eco-anarchists set on dismantling a dirty energy company and its power -hungry CEO. She risks everything to gain entry into their inner circle, but tragedy strikes just as she’s close to her goal.

Zoe Rasmussen, wearied by her role as energy magnate Phil Rasmussen's wife, clings unhappily to her situation to avoid facing off with her past. When grief-stricken Justine appears with a demand, Zoe is torn between terror and excitement. But Justine's actions have attracted dangerous forces, pulling Zoe’s 19-year-old daughter, Hannah into their midst. As all these women hurtle towards inevitable collision, they each face the choice: uphold the status quo, or risk shattering their lives in the name of what’s right.

About Jordan: 

Jordan Rosenfeld is author of the novels Fallout, Women in Red and Forged in Grace, and six books on the craft of writing, including the bestselling Make a Scene and How to Write a Page-Turner, Writing the Intimate Character, A Writer’s Guide to Persistence, Writing Deep Scenes and Write Free: Attracting the Creative Life. Her freelance essays and articles have been published in hundreds of publications, including The Atlantic, The Rumpus, LitHub, Publisher’s Weekly, The Cut, Scientific American and many more.

About TANNERY BAY:

Enter a world where time stands still, and summer never ends.  In the enchanted town of Tannery Bay, it’s July 37th, and then  July 2nd again, but the year is a mystery. Trapped in an eter nal loop, the residents embark on an extraordinary journey  of self-discovery, unity, and defiance against the forces that  seek to divide them. 

Otis and Joy, intrepid siblings, work with their family and  friends to oppose a formidable adversary: The Owners. These  cunning and ruthless old men, driven by insatiable greed,  hold the town hostage, exploiting its resources and dividing  its people. 

In this powerful #ownvoices narrative, Tannery Bay is a captivating tale of Black Joy and Queer Joy, and the ways in which  family is both biological and chosen, where love transcends  boundaries, and where art is a vehicle for change.

About Steven: 

Steven Dunn (a.k.a. Pothole, cuz he’s deep in these streets) is a Whiting Award winner who was shortlisted for Granta Magazine’s Best of Young American Novelists. He’s the author of three novels: Potted Meat, water & power, and Tannery Bay (FC2/University of Alabama Press, 2024), which is co-authored with his homie Katie Jean Shinkle.

Elonzo Wesley is a singer-songwriter based in Charlotte, NC. Raised on a farm in South Carolina's lowcountry, his childhood among the woods and fields deeply shaped his artistic voice. Rooted in Americana, Davis blends the timelessness of regional folk traditions with the fresh perspectives of modern indie music. His songs reflect a reverence for the beauty and sorrow of the past while embracing hope for a brighter future.

Elonzo Wesley has shared stages with acclaimed acts like The Devil Makes Three, Susto, Mipso, Greensky Bluegrass, and Shovels and Rope. The group has also graced prominent festivals, including Tuck Fest, Shakori Hills, Virginia Creeper Fest, and Brewers & Music Fest, while independently touring across the United States.

Bwandon is a singer-songwriter from Chicago, based here in Boulder. Inspired by Elliot Smith and Randy Newman, Bwandon’s music mixes pop songwriting with fun, often times satirical lyrics about love, nature, consciousness, and everything in between. 

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Bring an acoustic instrument and sit in with Boulder Old-Time Jam! Every first Thursday on the Trident Patio, starting at 6 p.m.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Earth to Aaron is a Boulder based band, bringing together a mix of alt-country, folk, pop, bluegrass and rock. Sounds like Grateful Dead meets James Taylor.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

And Now...Featuring: is a monthly variety show that features local artists of all kinds. Poets, Music makers, Comedians, Dancers, Performance Artists...

Come early for the open jam session from 6-6:30pm (bring an instrument, borrow one!)

Then, stay for the Variety Show from 6:30-8!

Hosted by Aimee Herman

For more info or to feature for an upcoming month, email: aimeeherman@gmail.com

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Internationally touring Boulder based musician, Rebecca Folsom, hosts a diverse group of singer songwriters for an evening of original heart opening and soul uplifting music. Rebecca’s songs have been described by Westword magazine as “Hitting like little earhquakes.”, and by Americana Highways as “Worthy of awe.” Join us for an evening of enlivening and inspiring music.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Tuesday September 9th

Trident Author Series

Amanda Giguere

Shakespeare & Violence Prevention

“In this guide, Giguere details a practical and proven method of utilizing Shakespeare as a teaching tool. This is an important contribution to studies in both applied Shakespeare and violence prevention, and it will be impactful in the hands of both practitioners and educators.”

—Dr. Lezlie C. Cross, The Guthrie Theater

“For those of us who believe Shakespeare provides opportunities for deep inquiry, personal expression, and powerful learning, it is essential that we find ways to explore the plays that engage today’s students by connecting with their lived experience. This is a clear, accessible handbook for replication that is useful for educators everywhere.”

—Mary Hartman, Director of Education, Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival

Shakespeare and Violence Prevention is a handbook that guides educators through an exploration of Shakespeare’s potential to address the public health issue of youth violence. Amanda Giguere presents Shakespeare’s plays as a tool to understand, address root causes of, and prevent violence in our own communities. Performance-based engagement with the plays in an educational setting allows students to explore violence-prevention strategies, practice empathy, and build safer communities. Youth violence is an all too relevant topic, and this text helps educators, theatre companies, and academic theatre departments understand new ways in which the performing arts can positively impact young people.

Framed by examples from Giguere’s work with the Shakespeare & Violence Prevention program, an interdisciplinary outreach project for K–12 schools developed at the University of Colorado Boulder, the text offers helpful entry points, digestible research, and practical exercises to align a violence-prevention curriculum with Shakespeare’s plays. It provides a condensed overview of key findings from violence prevention, clear synopses of the plays, and practicable strategies to implement the program. Guided by firsthand experience with a tried-and-true school program that reaches thousands of K–12 students annually, Giguere shares the Colorado Shakespeare Festival method, which focuses on “upstander” roleplays to practice violence-prevention strategies. Using a clear distillation of Shakespeare studies and violence-prevention research, she shows how the two fields naturally reinforce the concepts of teamwork, empathy, change, and hope.

Shakespeare and Violence Prevention  is a new spin on these classic texts that empowers teachers and community leaders to use these tools to create research-guided university engagement programs, theatre company outreach programs, and K–12 student engagement with Shakespeare, even for those without expertise in violence prevention or Shakespeare.

About Amanda:

Amanda Giguere is the Director of Outreach for the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, where she oversees all education and outreach programming. She also teaches for CU Boulder’s Applied Shakespeare certificate program. She holds an MA and PhD in Theatre from CU Boulder.

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Elizabeth Jacobson's new poems are both profound and transparent, which is rare. Also rare is their intimacy with the natural world, rendered in language memorable for its near-microscopic observation and precision. Set in the desert, the tropics, and the human mind, the poems move fluently from family to ecological grief to the life of the spirit and beyond. Curious, eloquent, surprising, and probing, this book takes a hard, compassionate look at what it means to be human right now, moment to moment, on this injured planet. It's a book that deepens every time I read it. -Chase Twichell, author of Things as It Is

Elizabeth Jacobson was the fifth poet laureate of Santa Fe, New Mexico and an Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow. Her new collection, There Are as Many Songs in the World as Branches of Coral is just out (Free Verse Editions/Parlor Press, 2025). Her previous collection, Not into the Blossoms and Not into the Air (FVE/Parlor Press, 2019), won the New Measure Poetry Prize selected by Marianne Boruch, and the 2019 New Mexico-Arizona Book Award for both New Mexico Poetry and Best New Mexico Book. She is also the author of Her Knees Pulled In (Tres Chicas Books, 2012); two chapbooks from Dancing Girl Press, “Are the Children Make Believe?” and “A Brown Stone”; and “Everything Feels Recent When You’re Far Away, Poetry and Art from Santa Fe Youth During the Pandemic” which she co-edited (Axle Books, 2021). Jacobson’s community projects have received nine consecutive grants from the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry. She is a reviews editor for the on-line magazine Terrain.org and directs the poetry programs at Santa Fe’s Center for Contemporary Arts (CCA).

And Now...Featuring: is a monthly variety show that features local artists of all kinds. Poets, Music makers, Comedians, Dancers, Performance Artists...

Come early for the open jam session from 6-6:30pm (bring an instrument, borrow one!)

Then, stay for the Variety Show from 6:30-8!

Hosted by Aimee Herman

For more info or to feature for an upcoming month, email: aimeeherman@gmail.com

Free! Every Monday evening, 7-9p.m. All languages welcome. Facilitated by Kelvin Tavarez.

Trident Author Series

Janet Ward Schofield & Discovering Bhutan

Tuesday, September 23rd, 2025

About: Discovering Bhutan: Land of Gross National Happiness

About Discovering Bhutan:
Discovering Bhutan provides an engaging and informative introduction to this remote and little-known Himalayan kingdom. It describes Bhutan’s extraordinary natural environment, discusses the ways in which its steep topography has impacted its development and examines the consequences of its strong environmental sustainability policies for everyday life.  It examines how fundamental tenets of Bhutan’s tantric Buddhism are evidenced in the daily lives of monks and demonstrates how animist beliefs help preserve the environment. Core aspects of Bhutanese identity including devotion to the monarchy, respect for authority, and deep connection to community and the extended family are highlighted as are evolving gender roles and marital practices. Finally, the origin of the idea of Gross National Happiness is explained and the extent to which Bhutan has moved toward its goals in that regard is discussed. This travelogue intertwines material from newspapers, folktales and other sources with the author’s extraordinary experiences during her decade in Bhutan to provide a vivid picture of a unique country and to stimulate Western readers to reflect on what can be learned from it.

About Janet Ward Schofield:

Prize-winning author Janet Ward Schofield has travelled to over one hundred countries on five continents. Bhutan, where she went on a one-year contract to help establish the country’s first private college and stayed for over a decade, is her favorite.  Before that, she was a professor of psychology for many years at the U. of Pittsburgh, and before that she taught at Spelman College. 

She has had Fulbright Fellowships in Poland and North Macedonia and consulted for Singapore’s National Institute of Education, Cambodia’s Center for the Study of Peace and Conflict and Germany’s WZB Berlin Social Science Research Centre.  She has given invited talks on five continents from Abu Dhabi and Australia to Uzbekistan. Her professional activities within the US range from leading a workshop for US Senators and Congressional Representatives to serving on National Academy of Sciences Boards and Committees. She was also elected to the governing body of the 173,000 member American Psychological Association, representing the Society for the Study of Peace, Conflict and Violence on the APA Council of Representatives.

Janet earned her AB, MA and PhD from Harvard University, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Her previous books on topics including intergroup relations and education have been characterized as   “brilliant,” “stunning” and “important” in reviews and commentary by noted individuals and her newest one, Discovering Bhutan,  has received similar accolades including “superb, ” “insightful and fascinating” and “A must read.” She now lives in Boulder.

About Moving The Bones:

A vulnerable and honest collection of poems exploring lineage, love, and the pandemic, from one of the most acclaimed poets of his generation.

“You are told to believe in one paradise / and then there is the paradise you come to know,” begins Rick Barot. What follows is an account of the rich and thorny valley between those poles. Moving the Bones dwells in liminal spaces—of love and memory, the pandemic’s singular domesticity, a serene cemetery of ancestral plots, dawn. In precise and tender verse, Barot captures the particularities of being in the middle of one’s life, reflecting on the joys and sorrows of the past and confronting the inevitabilities that lie ahead.

For Barot, this presence of mind is an art of being lost in thought. “My mind has a slow metabolism, it is slow / to understand what anything means,” he confides, “but understands that if you look at something / long enough, it will have something / to say to you.” Appreciating a Rembrandt, standing in a Goodwill, watching a boy with a flower behind his ear—we encounter ephemeral murmurs of meaning everywhere, but only by slowing down, listening. If we take time to notice the enduring insights of daily moments, if we praise cherry blossoms, lungs, and crying, we might find it easier to bear the loss of a loved one, the sting of solitude, the body’s decline.

By laying bare his own experiences, Barot brings us close enough to witness the lyrical work of consciousness. Patient and attentive, this collection illuminates the everyday and invites us to find pleasure in doing the same, at every stage of life.

About Rick Barot:

Rick Barot's most recent book of poems is Moving the Bones, published by Milkweed Editions in 2024.  His previous collection, The Galleons, was longlisted for the National Book Award.  His work has appeared in numerous publications, including Poetry, The New Republic, The Adroit Journal, and The New Yorker.  He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and Stanford University.  He lives in Tacoma, Washington and directs The Rainier Writing Workshop, the low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Pacific Lutheran University. 

About The End of Childhood:

A tender and provocative collection of poems interrogating the troubles and wonders of both childhood and parenthood against the backdrop of global violence.

From accomplished poet Wayne Miller comes a collection examining how an individual’s story both hues to and defies larger socio-political narratives and the sweep of history. A cubist making World War I camouflage, a forlorn panel on the ethics of violence in literature, an obsessive litany of “late capitalist” activities, a military drone pilot driving home after work—here, the awkward, the sweet, and the disturbing often merge. And underlying it all is Miller’s own domestic life with two children, who highlight the hopeful and ingenious aspects of childhood, which is “not // as I had thought / the thicket of light back at the entrance // but the wind still blowing / invisibly toward me / through it.”

The End of Childhood, Miller’s sixth collection of poems, is his most intimate, juxtaposing his own fraught youth with that of his children amid insurrection and pandemic, vacation and vocation, art and war. This piercing book spares nothing as it searches for a measure of personal benevolence and truth in today’s turbulent, brutalizing world—which it confronts through a singularly candid and lyrical voice.

About Wayne Miller:

Wayne Miller is the author of six poetry collections: The End of Childhood (2025), We the Jury (2021), Post- (2016), The City, Our City (2011), The Book of Props (2009), and Only the Senses Sleep (2006). His awards include the UNT Rilke Prize, two Colorado Book Awards, a Pushcart Prize, an NEA Translation Fellowship, six awards from the Poetry Society of America, the Bess Hokin Prize from Poetry, and a Fulbright Distinguished Scholarship to the Seamus Heaney Centre in Northern Ireland. He has co-translated two books from Albanian into English—most recently Moikom Zeqo’s Zodiac (2015), shortlisted for the PEN Center USA Award in Translation—and has co-edited three books, most recently Literary Publishing in the Twenty-First Century (2016). He lives in Denver, where he co-directs the Unsung Masters Series, teaches at the University of Colorado Denver, and edits Copper Nickel.

REX OGLE is an award-winning author and the writer of nearly a hundred children’s books, comics, graphic novels, and memoirs—most notably Free Lunch, which won the ALA/YALSA award for Excellence in Non-Fiction.  

He has written under several pseudonyms, including Trey King and Honest Lee, but is currently focused on reimagining classic literature as modern or fantastical graphic novels as REY TERCIERO, under which he penned bestselling Meg, Jo, Beth, & Amy, as well as Northranger, nominated for both a Harvey and GLAAD Media Award. 

Born and raised (mostly) in Texas, Rex moved to New York City after college to intern with Marvel Comics before moving over to DC Comics, Scholastic, and Little Brown Young Readers.  As an editor, he championed over a dozen NY Times Bestsellers and worked (and often wrote) on major brands such as X-Men, Justice League, Star Wars, LEGO, Power Rangers, Transformers, Minecraft, Assassin’s Creed, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Neil Patrick Harris’s Magic Misfits.  

Now, Rex lives in Los Angeles where he writes every day—that is, when he’s not outdoors hiking with his dog, playing MarioKart with friends, or thinking up new ideas for books

Trident Author Series

Betsy Gaines Quammen

True West: Myth and Mending on the Far Side of America

Tuesday November 18th

About Betsy:

Historian & Writer

Betsy Gaines Quammen is a historian and writer. She received a PhD from Montana State University where she studied religion, history and the philosophy of science. Her dissertation focused on Mormon history and the roots of armed public land conflicts occurring in the United States. She is fascinated at how religious views shape relationships to landscape. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, New York Daily News, and the History News Network. She is the author of American Zion: Cliven Bundy, God, and Public Lands in the West and True West: Myth and Mending on the Far Side of America. Betsy lives in Montana with her husband, writer David Quammen, three giant dogs, a sturdy cat, and a lanky rescue python.

About True West:

True West explores myths of the West and how, if left unexamined, they distort the realities of the present and exacerbate polarizations. These misperceptions about land, politics, liberty, and self-determination threaten the wellbeing of western communities overrun by newcomers seeking a dream—and the country, unless America recognizes the dangers of building a national identity on illusion. Gaines Quammen interrogates it all by listening, carefully, to people from varying political and cultural perspectives as she seeks to reconcile the deep anger and broad misunderstandings that linger amid myths that define and impede the West and America.