Local Poet Reflections Features Phil Repko, Robert Fillman, Brandon Krieg

On Monday, April 28, 2025, from 6:30-8:00 p.m., Firefly Bookstore, 271 West Main Street, Kutztown, PA 19530,  caps off National Poetry Month with an evening of poetry from our robust local collection of published poets. Get Directions

There is a passionate community of authors based in Berks County and Lehigh. The authors featured here are all bringing a variety of themes, voices and styles to the mix. Time allowing, we will open the floor to community poets to share their work. This event is free, and open to the public. There will be light refreshments served.

Our Poets with their recent works are:

Phil Repko himself describes the verse as grounded in the tradition of the literary canon, the British and American masters who were subjects for myriad lessons during his quarter-century as a high school English teacher. But he also promises that these pieces are inspired by contemporary trends, and the sensibilities of his sons, Philip and Ian, who have written with him each April, celebrating National Poetry Month, in the best way possible, by sharing the perspective of that millennial generation as they navigate the current battlefields of American life.

Pieces of April debuted November 23, 2024 from Anxiety Press. "Pieces of April resonated with me as a son, as a man, as a father, as a husband, and as a general human being navigating the 21st Century with all its vagaries and balderdash. Pieces of April will, when I'm finished, probably take up residence in the drawer of my night table. And on those evenings in bed when I crave something thoughtful - even prayerful - before losing my eyes, I'l reach for it. - Daniel Weckerly

Robert Fillman is the author of House Bird (Terrapin Books, 2022), the chapbook November Weather Spell (Main Street Rag, 2019), and the forthcoming collection The Melting Point. He has received prizes from Sheila-Na-Gig online, Third Wednesday, and The Twin Bill for select poems. He has been a finalist for the Cider Press Review Book Award, the Gerald Cable Book Award, the Sandy Crimmins Prize in Poetry, and the Ron Rash Award in Poetry. Individual poems have appeared in The Hollins Critic, Nashville Review, Paterson Literary Review, Pembroke Magazine, Poet Lore, Poetry East, Salamander, Spoon River Poetry Review, Sugar House Review, Tar River Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Verse Daily, and others. Fillman earned his Ph.D. at Lehigh University, where he was a Mountaintop Creative Writing Fellow. An Assistant Professor of English at Kutztown University, he currently lives in eastern Pennsylvania.

The Melting Point is being released in April 2025 by Broadstone Books. "The Melting Point builds on the momentum of Robert Fillman’s previous book, House Bird, in its continued exploration of the everyday in search of the poignancy and depth so many of us miss in the daily sameness of our lives—he can turn taking out the garbage into a transcendent experience. In the wake of harsh masculinity with its coded silences, he finds ways to redefine tenderness and toughness. The difficult intrusion of illness, the lingering effects of hard work, and both the ravages and comforts of alcohol, all cast their shadows over the ordinary homes in this fine collection." –Jim Daniels

Brandon Krieg is the author of Magnifier, winner of the 2019 Colorado Prize for Poetry. His other poetry collections are In the Gorge (2017), Invasives (2014), and a chapbook, Source to Mouth (2012). Two of his collections were finalists for the ASLE Book Award in Environmental Creative Writing and his work will be featured in Attached to the Living World: A New Ecopoetry Anthology, forthcoming from Trinity University Press. He grew up in Tualatin, OR, and now lives with his family in Kutztown, PA, where he teaches at Kutztown University.

Users with Access: New and Selected Stories is being released on April 15th by Cornerstone Press. "Brandon Krieg overfills the role of poet and presses hotly toward oracle. These poems permit singular courage, strength, and tenderness-a ferocious fullness for which I am made painfully grateful with each passing, precious word." - Caroline Manring, author of Ceruleana

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