Sunken Garden Poetry Festival featuring Billy Collins

At the Sunken Garden Poetry Festivals, renowned poets read

selections of their work in the historic and picturesque garden of Hill-Stead

estate. Viewers are welcome to bring their own seating. Food is available for

purchase from Tallula’s Catering. Evenings begin with music from various

artists, and poetry follows. Come rain or shine! Admission is $10 per person,

18 and under are free.

This week’s festival features musical group Indra and poet Billy

Collins.

Indra is an accomplished, adventurous jazz trio that was founded

in Aarhus, Denmark, featuring the supple and moving vocals of New York City

native Indra Rios-Moore on soulfully arranged songs. From American jazz

standards and contemporary arrangements of traditional folk songs to Mexican

boleros and newly composed pieces, Indra’s style and voice has been described

as a blend of Eva Cassidy’s blues and folk style with the charisma of the

legendary Sarah Vaughan.

Billy Collins is an American phenomenon. No poet since Robert

Frost has managed to combine high critical acclaim with such broad popular

appeal. His work has appeared in a variety of periodicals including The

New Yorker, The Paris Review, and The American Scholar; he is a

Guggenheim fellow and a New York Public Library “Literary Lion.” His last three

collections of poems have broken sales records for poetry. His readings are

usually standing room only, and his audience – enhanced tremendously by his

appearances on National Public Radio – includes people of all backgrounds and

age groups. The poems themselves best explain this phenomenon. The typical

Collins poem opens on a clear and hospitable note but soon takes an unexpected

turn; poems that begin in irony may end in a moment of lyric surprise. No

wonder Collins sees his poetry as “a form of travel writing” and considers

humor “a door into the serious.” It is a door that many thousands of readers

have opened with amazement and delight.