RICH FERGUSON
L.A. poet and spoken-word performer Rich Ferguson has shared the stage with Patti Smith, Wanda Coleman, Moby, and other esteemed poets and musicians. He is a featured performer in the film, What About Me? featuring Michael Stipe, Michael Franti, k.d. lang, and others. His poetry and award-winning spoken-word music videos have appeared in numerous anthologies and festivals. He is the author of two poetry collections 8th & Agony (Punk Hostage Press), and Everything is Radiant Between the Hates (Moon Tide Press) and the novel New Jersey Me (Rare Bird Books). Ferguson is the lead editor of Beat Not Beat (Moon Tide Press), an anthology of California poets moving the beat tradition. The poet was selected by the National Beat Poetry Foundation, Inc. (NBPF), to serve as California Beat Poet Laureate 2020 – 2022 and U.S. Beat Poet Laureate 2024 – 2025.
“it’s like he’s talking thunder”
Bob Holman
"Ferguson, with his impeccable word play, resurrects the ancestral verses of Wanda Coleman and Langston Hughes to help us find answers to the whats, hows, whens, whys, and wheres of our playgrounds."
Luivette Resto
"No other post-Beat poet has the hard-won longevity of such deeply felt affiliations,
and still feels absolutely contemporary.”
Bill Mohr
"Rich Ferguson could probably write better things in his sleep than most people can in their waking hours.”
Iris Berry
"Ferguson writes with the urgency of someone who knows words can still save us."
Derrick C. Brown
Derrick C. Brown