Photo of Sunland/Tujunga Wash by Maja Trochimczyk (2025)
Village Poets of Sunland/Tujunga is proud to bring renowned poet, Ron Koertge, in a solo feature on the 4th Sunday of February, the 22th, 4:30 pm at Bolton Hall Museum. There will also be an open mic and poets are invited to participate in the open reading segment of the event. The Bolton Hall Museum is located at 10110 Commerce Ave, Tujunga, CA 91040. Bolton Hall is a Los Angeles Historical Landmark built in 1913. Our reading starts at 4:30 pm and goes till 6:30 pm. Light refreshments will be served. Free parking is available on the street and also at Elks Lodge 10137 Commerce Ave. Park behind the building and walk a short distance to Bolton Hall Museum across the street and down the block.
Ron Koertge was appointed Poet Laureate of South Pasadena in June of 2018.
He attended high school in Collinsville, Illinois, graduated University of Illinois in 1962, University of Arizona in 1965. He taught at the city college in Pasadena for thirty-seven years. His poetry writing workshop at Pasadena City College was one of the department’s most popular classes. An entertaining and dynamic reader, Billy Collins calls him “sly, inventive and deeply good-hearted.”
A prolific writer, he published widely in the 60’s and 70’s in such seminal magazines as Kayak, Poetry Now, and The Wormwood Review. He continues to publish today, favoring truly independent magazines like Rattle, Nerve Cowboy, River Styx. Sumac Press issued The Father Poems in 1973, and that book was followed by many more: Meat (1973, Mag Press), The Hired Nose (1974, Mag Press), My Summer Vacation ( 1975 Venice Poetry), Cheap Thrills(Wormwood Review Press, 1976), Men Under Fire (Duck Down Press, 1976) (Red Hill Press, 1976), Sex Object (Little Caesar Press, 1979) The Jockey Poems (1980 Maelstrom Press), Diary Cows (Little Ceasar Press, 1981), Fresh Meat (Kenmore Press, 1981), Life on the Edge of the Continent: Selected Poems (University of Arkansas Press, 1982), High School Dirty Poems (Red Wind Press, 1991), Making Love to Roget’s Wife (University of Arkansas Press, 1997), Geography of the Forehead (University of Arkansas Press, 1997), Fever (Red Hen Press, 2006), Indigo (Red Hen Press, 2009), The Ogre’s Wife (Red Hen Press, 2013), Sex Object (Red Hen Press, 2014), Yellow Moving Van, (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018).
Koertge is the recipient of grants from the N.E.A. and the California Arts Council, has poems in two volumes of Best American Poetry (1999 and 2005). He won a Pushcart Prize in 2017. His most recent book from Red Hen Press is Pandora’s Kitchen.. He is also the author of “Negative Space,” short-listed for an Oscar in Animated Short Films (2018). He was included in Volume 380 in the Dictionary Of Literary Biography series: Twenty-First-Century American Poets.
Three Poems by Ron Koertge
Ideal Reader
I found a book of mine in a summer cottage,
and I wondered who was tired of gazing at the lake
or reading mysteries from the rickety bookcase
so turned to poetry one rainy afternoon.
I like to think of him when someone in a blue
bikini leans in for a preliminary kiss
and he says, “Wait a minute. Look at this first.”
Published in “Glimpse” magazine
The Afterlife
I’ve been dead for years, so this place suits me.
Sixty thousand channels thanks to cable.
Love the game room and those herbal teas.
Everyone remembers Betty Grable.
Sixty thousand channels thanks to cable.
Sleep’s not a problem, we’re all deceased.
Everyone remembers Betty Grable.
Marilyn Monroe keeps asking for a priest.
Sleep’s not a problem, we’re all deceased
tucked in among a thousand souvenirs.
Marilyn Monroe keeps asking for a priest.
Frank Sinatra hums the music of the spheres.
Tucked in among a thousand souvenirs,
there’s room for clippings and my Betamax.
Frank Sinatra hums the music of the spheres.
Every afternoon I wax my Cadillacs.
There’s room for clippings and my Betamax.
The past is present like a golden key.
Every afternoon I wax my Cadillacs.
I’ve been dead for years, so this place suits me.
Published in Rattle
The Old West
Rope at her slender
ankles.
Villain in a black
mustache
looming. RR
tracks
throbbing
and hot.
Explosions
in the distance.
Billy the Kid
and his gang
of incorrigible
toddlers.
Published in “3rd Wednesday”
© 2026 Ron Koertge All Rights Reserved
(Photo by Maja Trochimczyk 2026)
