Remembering Hal Sirowitz
Ends on
Remembering Hal Sirowitz
(March 6, 1949 to October 17, 2025)
Hal was an American poet, who first began to attract attention at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe where he was a frequent competitor in their Friday Night Poetry Slam. He eventually made the 1993 Nuyorican Poetry Slam team and competed in the 1993 National Poetry Slam along with his Nuyorican teammates Maggie Estep, Tracie Morris, and Regie Cabico.
He would later perform his poetry on stages across the country, and on television programs such as MTV's Spoken Word: Unplugged and PBS's The Unites States of Poetry. He wrote eleven books of poetry, including volumes Mother Said, My Therapist Said, and Father Said. He was the best-selling translated poet in Norway, where Mother Said has been adapted for the stage and turned into a series of animated cartoons.
Sirowitz was a 1994 recipient of an NEA Fellowship in Poetry and was the Poet Laureate of Queens. He worked as a special education teacher in the New York public school system for 23 years and was married to writer Mary Minter Krotzer.
On October 17th, 2025, Sirowitz died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was 76.
Send us a poem about Hal or inspired by him.
Deadline: April 5th, 2026
Reading Event: May 3rd, 2026
Submission Guidelines: Write a poem on Hal Sirowitz or inspired by him.
Keep this poem limited to 35 lines total. When determining the total line length for each poem, include spaces between stanza (ex: a poem of 5 couplets would equal 14 lines). Numbers or section breaks should also be included as lines when calculating the total line length. Count an epigraph as 3 extra lines. A line that has more than 60 characters (including spaces and punctuation) should be counted as two lines. If lines are staggered like a Ferlinghetti poem, estimate the width of the line.
The final book will be printed in 11 point Garamond font on pages that are 4.5 inches wide. Poems with lines longer than 4.5 inches may be changed or denied due to printing constraints.
For questions or inquiries, please email Larry Robin at larry@moonstoneartscenter.com