Senior Staff Writer

Every second Thursday of the month, published poets, emerging poets and those who have a love of poetry gather to read their work and embrace the work of others at Russo’s Bookstore in The Marketplace.

This month’s featured poet was Estella Aguilar, 37, news assistant at The Bakersfield Californian and newly published author of “My Absolute Fragile Essence.”

“I think that just really describes my soul. I’m basically exposing my heart, my inner workings, my mind, and my thoughts to the whole world. It’s basically me stripping down to the bare essence of myself,” Aguilar said when describing her book and where the idea for the title came from.

During the open mic night Aguilar shared some of her work from her book. The topics of the poems she shared varied, including “Loss and Grief” that was inspired by a news story she had read about a woman who had lost her husband to a car accident, “Ambiguous” inspired by someone she met online and “Composure” based off of a guy she had a crush on for 10 years.

Following Aguilar’s reading, members of the audience were given the chance to share their own work or works of poets they admire.

Engineering graduate Jhai Cole shared “Images in the Mirror,” a poem about two lovers who are undecided about the nature of their relationship and how one person in the relationship has lost their own individual identity.

Senior psychology major and author Shamir Griffin also shared one of his works, “Modern Day Warriors.”

Kern County Deputy Public Health Officer, author and MC for the evening, Portia Choi closed the event with some poetry of her own, including “Dog Moon” and “Death is a Miracle.”

“We have good poets right here in Bakersfield and emerging poets who can come to read their poetry. There was a mother with her three daughters and it was really neat because two of them are writers,” Choi said about the open mic night.

The evening ended with photos and a book signing with Aguilar. Open mic nights are every second Thursday at 6:30 p.m. and sign-ups to perform start at 6:20 p.m. May 18, Russo’s will be hosting its third annual release party and poetry reading for the literary magazine, “A Sharp Piece of Awesome.”

Aguilar and Choi will be in attendance to read their works from the magazine.