From October 10-12, 2025, Seattle-based poetry nonprofit Cascadia Poetics Lab will host the 9th Cascadia Poetry Festival at venues including the Rainier Beach Community Club, Kubota Garden, and Redwing Café. The festival gathers poets and bioregionalists to explore poetry's connection to environmental, political, historical, and sociological pursuits within the Cascadia bioregion, aiming to address climate change and other pressing issues by prioritizing natural and cultural boundaries over arbitrary political ones.
Featured speakers include Brenda Cárdenas, Jim Dott, Brenda Hillman, Zach Charles, Roberto Harrison, Alicia Hokanson, Robert Lashley, Lorin Medley, Rhea Melina, Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs, Roxi Power, Robert Michael Pyle, Paul Nelson, Sharon Thesen, Matt Trease, Jason Wirth, and Katie Sarah Zale. Workshops will explore ekphrasis, investigation, lyric and form, the connection between internal and external worlds, and poetry in times of crisis. An afterparty hosted by Greg Bem of Carbonation Press and Cascadia 2050, the lab's youth initiative, will take place at Jude's in Rainier Beach.
Sponsors include 4Culture, Creative West, National Endowment for the Arts, Seattle Office of Arts and Cultural Affairs, ArtsFund, La Sala, Subud Greater Seattle, and ArtsWA. Registration for gold passes, workshop packages, reading packages, and student passes is available on the festival website at https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/cascadia-poetry-festival-9/. More information and the complete schedule can be found at https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/ and https://cascadiapoeticslab.org/2025-cascadia-poetry-festival-9-schedule/.
The importance of this festival lies in its unique approach to using poetry as a lens for environmental and political discourse, directly engaging with climate change and social issues. By bringing together poets and bioregionalists, it fosters a dialogue that transcends traditional boundaries, potentially influencing how communities perceive and respond to ecological challenges. This year's festival continues the lab's mission since its founding in 1993, emphasizing the power of creative expression in shaping regional identity and action.
