Come join us for the first night of what will undoubtedly be the worst 8 days of our lives.

WORST CASE ONTARIO poetry reading tour kicks off in the gritty Kensington market of this province's capital. There will be friends, chapbooks, weird poets, art and probably an after party where we absolutely clog the shit outta Ronnies.

Come rage.

~~ F E A T U R I N G ~~

JESSICA "BLUE BLAZER" BEBENEK

is a Toronto poet and writer with work appearing in Prairie Fire, Grain, The Puritan, and Little Brother, among other places. She is the founder of the micro-press Grow & Grow and the author of three chapbooks, most recently Kettle Song. This fall, she will begin an MA in English & Creative Writing at Concordia University to continue work on her first full collection of poetry, tentatively titled No One Knows Us There. But mainly right now she knits.

JC "THE SECOND COMING" BOUCHARD

was born in Elliot Lake, a former mining town in northern Ontario. His poetry has appeared (or forthcoming) in Arc, untethered, In/Words, (parenthetical), Rappahannock Review, Control, and more. One of his poems was long-listed for the CBC Poetry Prize and another received Honourable Mention for the John Newlove Poetry Award from Bywords. He is the author of two chapbooks: “Portraits” (In/Words Press), and “Wool Water” (words(on)pages), forthcoming in Fall 2015. He lives in Toronto. Twitter: @jcbouchard_.

dalton "low class, lowercase" derkson

is a punk poet from the prairies, currently residing in Toronto. He runs Hurtin’ Crüe Press, a D.I.Y. collective through which he promotes fellow Canadian poets and self-publishes too many chapbooks. Upon arriving in the city, he was superkicked by The Party Animal and quite frankly, his poems haven’t been the same since. For proof, check out his recent work in ottawater, SPANK the CARP, and In/Words Magazine or find him on Twitter @dirtyderk.

JM "THE EXCELLENCE OF EXECUTION" FRANCHETEAU

is a rural transplant based in Ottawa, ON. His writing has appeared mostly recently in CV2, Arc, Broken Pencil and untethered, and his second chapbook, kids, is out with Hurtin’ Crüe Press. He cowrites the zine Nightshift and organizes the Ottawa Zine Off! series. https://jmfrancheteau.wordpress.com/

JULIE "RUN YOUR JULES" MANNELL

is a Montreal-based writer of prose, poetry, and essays, originally from Fonthill, Ontario. Mannell currently writes for The Huffington Post, and her work has appeared in several journals, magazines, and textbooks. She is the recipient of the Lionel Shapiro Award for Excellency in Creative Writing and The Mona Adilman Poetry Prize. Mannell founded the McGill Creative Writing Society where she facilitated workshops and panels for three years. In 2012 Roseanne Barr gave Mannell the Vagenius Award. Visit www.juliemannell.com and follow her on Twitter @juliemannell.

worstcaseontario-tour.tumblr.com

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