Poet Profile

Laszlo Slomovits

Laszlo Slomovits is one of the twin brothers in the children’s folk music duo, Gemini (GeminiChildrensMusic.com). A fine singer and multi-instrumentalist, Laszlo has given concerts throughout the U.S., and a number of his award-winning songs are featured in songbooks music teachers use throughout North America. In addition to his performances, songwriting, and recording for children, he has set to music the work of many poets. His recordings of these song-settings include five CDs of the poetry of ancient Sufi mystics, Rumi (translated by Coleman Barks) and Hafiz (translated by Daniel Ladinsky), as well as Cry of Freedom, the poetry of Linda Nemec Foster. Laszlo’s most recent musical project is Receiving the Shore, a book/music CD collaboration with poet Jennifer Burd. In addition to his work in music, Laszlo has had haiku, senryu, and rengay published in many print and online journals; Modern Haiku, Acorn, The Heron’s Nest, Frogpond, Mariposa, bottle rockets, hedgerow, Presence, Kingfisher, and Trash Panda. Laszlo has also had lyric poems published in a variety of print and online magazines, including Rattle, California Quarterly, and Third Wednesday.

Awards and Other Honors:

First place, along with Michele Root-Bernstein and Jenifer Burd, in the 2024 San Francisco International Rengay Competition; Honorable Mention, along with Michele Root-Bernstein and Jenifer Burd, in the 2022 Haiku Society of America Rengay Awards; First place, along with Michele Root-Bernstein and Jennifer Burd, in the 2021 San Francisco International Rengay Competition; Second and third place, along with Michele Root-Bernstein and Jennifer Burd, in the 2020 Inaugural HSA Garry Gay Rengay Award.

In addition, the children’s music recordings Laszlo has created along with his twin brother Sandor have won awards from the American Library Association, Early Childhood News, and Parents’ Choice Magazine, among others.

Laszlo’s lyric poetry chapbook, Masks and Blessings, was one of the winners in the 2019 Celery City Chapbook Contest sponsored by the Friends of Poetry in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

riding an invisible
pogo stick
robin in the grass

sparks from a campfire
the little lies
that improve the story

chocolate shop window
the child leaves
both handprints

saying goodbye my aging mother’s jeweling eyes

thickening fog
my neighbor’s house
strangely familiar

on condition
of anonymity . . .
deep forest blooms

Credits:

“riding an invisible” – Kingfisher Issue 4, Oct. 2021; “sparks from a campfire” – Mariposa 46, Spring / Summer 2022; also in skipping stones: The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2022, Red Moon Press, 2023; “chocolate shop window” – Modern Haiku vol. 55.1 Winter-Spring 2024; “saying goodbye” – Frogpond Vol. 47:1, Winter 2024; “thickening fog” – Presence Issue 78, Spring 2024; “on condition” – The Heron’s Nest Vol. XXVI, No. 4: Dec. 2024; also in The Midwest Haiku Traveling Rock Garden 2025.