Poetry by Gary Whitehead at the College

Gary J. Whitehead just had one of his poems published in The New Yorker. "Pretend It Was Just the Wind," in which the speaker describes floodwaters gently raising the entire contents of his house, was in the Jan. 7 issue.  

Cause for celebration, no? How about a reading. Namely for the Writers Speak series on Wednesday at Stony Brook Southampton. He'll be there with his latest collection, also from January and sporting the telling title "Strange What Rises." Terrapin Books is the publisher.

The guy confounds, as a builder of crossword puzzles, and elucidates, as a teacher of English at Tenafly High School in New Jersey. He lives in the Hudson River Valley, maybe even in a flood zone.

If you haven't been, the Writers Speak gatherings start with a wine-and-cheese reception at 6:30 p.m. in Chancellors Hall, and the readings are at 7. A question-and-answer period and a chance to have books signed conclude up the evenings. Admission is free.

The series continues on April 3 with a master of the short story, Amy Hempel, who happens to be as well a newish hire in the college's M.F.A. program, and Julia Slavin, whose "The Woman Who Cut Off Her Leg at the Maidstone Club, and Other Stories" has recently been reissued.