New Poetry in an Old Setting

    The Old Schoolhouse in Greenport last held a kindergarten class in 1932. And now for something completely different: On March 15 Robin Becker will read there from “Tiger Heron,” her new collection of poems from the University of Pittsburgh Press with subject matter ranging from her lesbianism to her Russian-Jewish heritage to her upbringing in conformist 1950s America to art history.

    You want bio? Ms. Becker is a summertime North Forker who teaches English and women’s studies at Penn State, where she was recently poet laureate. Her seven previous collections have earned her a Lambda Literary Award in Lesbian Poetry and Prairie Schooner magazine’s Virginia Faulkner Award for Excellence in Writing. She edits poetry and writes a column about it for the journal Women’s Review of Books.

    The reading starts at 5 p.m., and joining in will be Vivian Eyre with her new chapbook of poems, “To the Sound.”

    The Old Schoolhouse is at the corner of Front and Second Streets (not its original location, but close enough). Now a museum, it dates to the first half of the 19th century, back when the village was known as Stirling. (Not as ruinous a loss as the Oysterponds-to-Orient name change, and perhaps even understandable.)

    So the question becomes: What’s so funny about a couple of jaunty ferry rides to catch some poetry in funky Greenport?