The Committee which produces the Kent County Poetry Festival is elated to announce that the festival will now be known as the Robert Earl Price Poetry Festival in memory of Kent County’s honorary poet laureate and founder of the Kent County Poetry Festival 17 years ago.  Mr. Price passed away in April 2025. The Poetry Festival committee, made up of Meredith Davies Hadaway, James Allen Hall, Tess Jones, Tom Martin, Robert Ortiz, Leslie Raimond and John Schratwieser, unanimously voted to change the name after requesting permission to do so from Robert Earl’s wife, Carol Colgate.

This year’s festival takes place March 27, 28 and 29. The committee is also excited to welcome MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Fellow and Pulitzer Prize winning poet Jericho Brown to the 2026 festival.  Jericho Brown is author of The Tradition (Copper Canyon 2019), for which he won the Pulitzer Prize. He is also the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard, and the National Endowment for the Arts, and he is the winner of the Whiting Award. Brown’s first book, Please (New Issues 2008), won the American Book Award. His second book, The New Testament (Copper Canyon 2014), won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award. His third collection, The Tradition won the Paterson Poetry Prize and was a finalist for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. Dr. Brown will, in addition to the main event Saturday evening, offer two student workshops during his visit, one at Kent County High School and one at Washington College. Dr. Brown will offer a public reading at the main event on Saturday, March 28 followed by an on-stage conversation with James Allen Hall, Director of the Rose O’Neill Literary House at Washington College.

The Festival will also welcome back this year Maryland’s Poet Laureate Lady Brion as host of our Poetry Jam event. Started in 2025, the Poetry Jam offers another opportunity for local and regional poets to perform their work in the style of the old Jam events of the 1990’s with a full band improvising behind the poets. Returning to perform are Gerry Werner (Piano), JR McKinney (Drums), and Vaughn Bratcher (Bass).  Lady Brion will host and perform her own work during the evening.  

Another newer component of the festival, the Eco Poetry Workshop, will continue this year with local celebrity poet Meredith Davies Hadaway. The workshop will be limited to 15 participants and will take place at Sultana Education Foundation’s Lawrence Wetlands Preserve.

Of course, the Festival will culminate with the event that started it all, 17 years ago, in the back room of The Bookplate with Robert Earl Price, Christopher Ames and Tom Martin: The Poetry OPEN MIC event. For the final time, the event will take place at Robert Ortiz Studios in Chestertown on the Sunday afternoon of the Festival weekend.  Mr. Ortiz is retiring and closing his shop; the Open Mic event will find a new venue for 2027.