Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

League of Minnesota Poets is launching its Indy Book Store Tour to highlight their 86th volume of poetry, “Agates.”

More than 60 Minnesota poets will read in about 30 independent bookstores throughout Minnesota in the coming months, including Sweet Reads Books and Candy at 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 24.

“We’re doing this to celebrate and spotlight Minnesota’s literary wealth of poets and independent bookstores,” said Amanda Bailey, president of the League of Minnesota Poets.

Seven poets will be sharing their work at Sweets Reads and will correspond with the store’s open mic night that the bookstore has hosted for several years.

Works by Vicky King, Keegan Larson, Patrick Hansel, and many more share space in the Minnesota section of the bookstore. The working piano in the bookstore also is lined with poetry including nationally acclaimed poets like Amanda Gorman, Billy Collins, Mary Oliver, and others.

The 82 page “Agates” contains collected works from Minnesota’s poets, and is put together by League members. It’s edited by Nicole Borg in St. Cloud, and designed by DeborahGraphix in Eagle Lake. It is printed by Bookmobile in Minneapolis.

Founded in 1934, the League of Minnesota Poets fosters poets and poetry throughout the state by sponsoring conferences, poetry retreats, readings, performances, contests, slams, and workshops. In 1937, the League issued its first volume of a poetry magazine, and every year since has produced a volume in one form or another. Some years the volume offered slender quarterly or bimonthly issues, but now it has become a fatter, poetry-packed once a year issue.

This state poetry society has hundreds of members dispersed among eight chapters in various regions of the state and one that meets weekly on Zoom.

More information about this League can be found at mnpoets.com.