Poetry Readings At Women’s Center

DANBURY — The Women’s Center of Greater Danbury will present a reading featuring poets Doris Henderson and Marianela Medrano. The program will be offered on Saturday, November 15, from 3 to 5 pm. The event, sponsored by the Fifty Plus Group, will also include an open mic.

The Women’s Center is at 2 West Street in Danbury, just off Main Street and next to Danbury Public Library. Call 731-5200 for directions or additional information.

Doris Henderson has given numerous readings in Connecticut, as well as presentations with Golden Fleece Ltd., a chamber theater for poets and composers in New York City. She has been a guest on local radio programs in Danbury and Norwalk, reading and discussing poetry for high school and college audiences.

A former teacher and drama coach, Ms Henderson was also employed at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals in Danbury. She is a longtime member of Danbury Women’s Center, writing and editing for its newsletter in the “early days” at the old library building on Main Street.

Ms Henderson’s poems have appeared in The New Press, Connecticut River Review, Comstock Review, Slant, Parting Gifts, Red Flower, Heartbeat Of New England, Calliope, and other journals and anthologies. As president of the Danbury chapter of Connecticut Poetry Society Ms Henderson also facilitates a monthly writing workshop at Danbury Library.

Marianela Medrano is a Dominican poet who has lived in Connecticut since 1990. She writes in Spanish but often offers bilingual readings at colleges, libraries, community centers and other venues in New York and Connecticut. She is a former CT Commission on the Arts Fellowship recipient and received first prize in New Milford Commission of the Arts 2001 poetry contest, and third prize in Connecticut Commission on the Arts 2002 Literary Contest.

Aside from her writing Ms Medrano also works in the social work field. She has been a family worker with Head Start in both New York and Connecticut, and is currently working with a community of elderly, disabled and fixed-income families in Danbury, where she facilitates “Poetry Therapy,” among other programs.

Ms Medrano was site coordinator for the Urban Artists Initiative Program in the City of Norwalk, a program sponsored by Connecticut Commission on the Arts and The Institute for Community Research. She has had her work appear in a number of publications.