Poetry Night Hike 2025

For the second consecutive year, the Poetry Night Hike will take place in Sigulda, marking the beginning of the poetry festival “Sigulda Poetry Days and Nights”. During the hike, you will hear performances from over 60 poets in poetry readings and performances. Special guests of the Poetry Night Hike include poets Andris Akmentiņš, Ilmārs Šlāpins, Jānis Rokpelnis, Guntars Godiņš, and Contra.

PROGRAM

When the trains from Riga and Valga arrive in Sigulda on Saturday afternoon, participants and companions will gather at Sigulda Station Square, where the Poetry Night Hike will be inaugurated. This year's hike route will lead from Sigulda Station Square to Krusta Hill, the Gauja Riverbank, Dainu Hill, Turaida Church, Gūtman Cave, and after midnight return to Sigulda – at the New Castle Quarter, where the morning will be greeted with poetry. Throughout the hike, the Sigulda jazz duo “Jaunskungi” by Gunta Kursiša and Artūra Barisa will provide musical accompaniment.  

15:45 – 16:30
First stop – individual poetry readings at Sigulda Station Square

Marija Luīze Meļķe will perform “Individual Poetry Readings” alongside five poets from her generation: Raimonds Ķirķis, Marta Madara Grantiņa, Māra Ulme, Aleksandrs Barons, and Betija Zvejniece. The authors share not only the elastic age group but also interdisciplinary experiences, engaging in theater, visual arts, music, film, and other activities alongside poetry writing. One might think that these people, so familiar with performance art, are not fazed by the audience, but that's not true. Just as the listener experiences various emotions from a poem read solely for them, the author feels this presence and is subject to unpredictable impulses, which is the beauty of it. In a way, of course, this is still theater, but on the other hand, two people truly meet, and at that moment, they are united by the poem.

17:30 – 18:05
Second stop – Performance by Inga Gaile and the author group “Poets in the Elevator” with “4000 Years of Poets in the Elevator” at Krusta Hill

Participants: Inga Gaile, Dita Putniņa, Dita Vīksna, Raimonda Arāja, Jānis Buholcs, Sandra Marta Grudule.
Krusta Hill is named so because it once had a cross. It is also called Gallows Hill and Little Death Hill. Archaeologists have found evidence left by the Zemgalians of Vidzeme – since the second millennium BC, Livonians and Crusaders have also lived here. Between us and our ancestors are centuries or millennia. It's impossible to uncover everything that happened to them over these 4000 years – unless it's alternative history, about which the group “Poets in the Elevator” knows everything. During the performance, the group will allow glimpses into some random points of this history.

18:30 – 18:55
Third stop – Poetry readings by Andris Akmentiņš at the Gauja Bridge

Andris Akmentiņš currently tries to perform as rarely as possible, and larger works are his way to concentrate the chaotic flow of ideas. “However, walking in nature and measuring oneself is necessary at least once a year. In my 20 minutes, I will introduce poems from the almost finished children's poetry book “Presence” and look into fragments of a Hamlet-like Poetry play (which, thankfully, still has no title)” – says Andris.

19:25 – 20:00
Fourth stop – Performance by the author group “Preiļi Conceptualists” with “Accreditation of Dainu Hill” at Dainu Hill in the Turaida Museum Reserve

Participants: Elvīra Bloma, Anna Auziņa, Kārlis Vērdiņš, Arvis Viguls, Aivars Madris, Raimonds Ķirķis.
The Preiļi Conceptualists' accreditation commission has been dealing with accreditation since 2020, when Finland was accredited. In 2024, the commission went to spread knowledge in the town of Future and later spread it in Estonia, where they carefully evaluated Tartu's eligibility for the status of European Capital of Culture. Tartu still awaits the decision of the expert commission in sealed envelopes, signed with secure electronic signatures. Since then, the group has also accredited the Rainis and Aspazija Museum and the Salaspils Municipality Library. It seems that the future began precisely in Future, as accreditation does not end, and the Preiļi Conceptualists will not stop until all institutions, houses, paths, trees, rivers, and lakes in Latvia and Europe, and worldwide are accredited. It's time for Dainu Hill. Let the great accreditation work begin!

20:15 – 20:40
Fifth stop – Poetry readings by Ilmārs Šlāpins in the courtyard of Turaida Castle

In a world dominated by a passionate and unrestrained cult of youth, Ilmārs Šlāpins has decided to prove that there is nothing new in all of this. In the language of poetry, it is possible to speak about the most mundane and banal things – loneliness, aging, and death. In poems from the latest collection “a person without a definite lifestyle,” an apparently intimate and personal experience of life and relationships in the modern world is documented, yet it attempts to equalize and unite each of us, using poetic means to make the text a conscious adventure and prove that we can always choose something else. Something better than what we have been until now.

21:00 – 21:30
Sixth stop – Poetry readings by Jānis Rokpelnis in Turaida Church

On the eve of his jubilee, Jānis Rokpelnis will read his latest poems, which will be published in the collection “Awakening” by the publisher “Neputns” in September. Poems are currently pouring out for Rokpelnis, and he must hurry to write them down. Once, when poet Mirdza Bendrupe was at Jānis's current age and wrote a lot, but Jānis was sparing with his words, she, giving her collection, inscribed this greeting to Jānis: “Listen, my dear – no matter how much good you have done for me, but if you intend to write as little as before, I, indeed, will simply beat you one day – and you won't be able to hit back due to a gentleman's integrity!”. These words now serve as a drive and justification for the poet, as writing has become like repaying an old debt.

22:00 – 22:35
Seventh stop – Poetry readings by Guntars Godiņš and Estonian poet Contra “Both Good” at Gūtman Cave

“At Gūtman Cave, we will read poems invented back when Gūtmanis still lived in the cave, but which are still relevant today. The poems will mainly be in Estonian, but most of them will be in Latvian. You can laugh seriously and become seriously humorous” – this is how Godiņš and Contra announce their readings.

22:45 – 24:00
Eighth stop – Camping “Dainas”

Rest, campfire, soup, coffee, songs, dances…
Poetry readings: Rēzija Krieviņa, Valters Liberts, Elīna Līce, Uvis Leskavnieks, Viviāna Zariņa, Anete Pulkstene, Alise Zālīte

1:00 – 2:00
Ninth stop – Sigulda Castle Ruins

1:00 Poetry readings by Sigulda poets: Lea Vinks, Aija Rozena, Marta Veismane, Ulrika Ūpe, Endijs Graudiņš.

1:30 The author group “Texture” – Sandra Ratniece, Iveta Šimkus, Kristaps Vecgrāvis, Džena Andersone, Leons Jūlijs Strupītis – will perform a lecture “The Anatomy of Writing (Creativity)”. Writing is inextricably linked to creativity, the writer's emotions, thinking, knowledge, but in its expressions, the body also participates consciously, but more often unconsciously, thus revealing the importance of body language and senses during the moments of text creation. The members of the author group “Texture” will reflect on these and other revealing questions of the anatomy of writing.

2:00 – 7:00
Tenth stop – New Castle Quarter

2:00 Under the cover of night, loners – Liepa Rūce, Dārta Sīka, Ulvis Zirnis, Anna Dzintare, Lāsma Olte, Sintija Sudmale, Valentīns, Mygluojs, Agrita Grīnvalde, Gaiķu Māris – will emerge from their cells. On the bridge leading to the New Castle terrace, they will read unsanctioned poetry. All writers are loners, but some, at some moment, in some reference system, from some point of view, appear or feel like bigger loners than other loners. And that is so changeable – in one moment, you can feel like a loner, but in the next, find yourself in the middle of life's whirlpool. The composition of loners is changeable, just like the feeling of loneliness.

3:00 In the garden of the New Castle, “postmystics” – Elīna Vendija Rībena, Māra Ulme, Betija Zvejniece, Alise Bogdanova, Paula Lūcija Lejiņa – will participate with the performance “Faces”. They will reflect on their face – the one others impose on you, the one that doesn't belong to you, and the one you can influence. As the “postmystics” manifesto states:  “post-mysticism, like post-irony, is simultaneously on both fronts – acknowledging mystical experiences and at the same time denying any as reality and consciousness, recognizing the boundaries and constraints of subjectivism as well as interpretation.”

3:45 In the Castle Square, “13th Course” – Ivars Vācers, Dainis Deigelis, Mārtiņš Pommers, Alise Mētra, Ginta Gerbaševska, Agnese Blaua – will perform “a city”. Stories or no stories, the city is freedom and…  we strive for light, air, water, we listen to legends, develop tales, unearth proofs in cycles of different winds – this is the real one. The nature of the city person. The room. No!? Well-grounded proofs, not those based on piles, in loudest voices. Most often, silent vapors avoid a mark – like dust in corners whining without their sun. Living in the frequency of their own sun, the world's cities.

4:25 In the Castle Pavilion, “Syntax Stupor” – Arnolds Sčuckis, Aļesja Ščucka, Laima Ābele, Andris Alps, Kristīne Juckoviča, Pauls Kauķis, Katrīna Jēkabsone, Meldra Ķemere, Kaspars Sils – will perform “Cracks of Silence”, where poetry mixed with music, with crack and crunch effects, defects are expected. Perhaps a poem will be broken. Video from “Syntax Stupor” readings in Pēterala will be shown.

From 5:00 until the first trains Poetry readings at the open microphone will take place in the Castle Pavilion.

Anyone interested can follow the hike with personal transport or apply for available seats on the bus in the Facebook group “Poetry Night Hike”.

The poetry festival “Sigulda Poetry Days and Nights” is organized by the cultural center “Siguldas devons”. Financially supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation.