Please join Toussaint St. Negritude and Nadine Budbill as they honor and celebrate two important events: Juneteenth, which recognizes the end of slavery in the United States—as well as the ongoing struggle for racial justice; and the recent release of a new and revised edition of David Budbill's Judevine: A Love Song for a Place and Its People.

With interconnected themes of social, economic, and racial injustice, this free event features poetry, community, conversation, and love for the Northeast Kingdom. Readings will be given by Toussaint St. Negritude, Nadine Budbill, and students from Hazen Union School's drama program.

Toussaint St. Negritude is the author and winner of the 2025 Firebird Award for his poetry collection Mountain Spells. He is the former Poet Laureate of Belfast, Maine, and 2024 Nominee for Poet Laureate of Vermont and bass clarinetist and composer. On an alpine sanctuary facing east, Toussaint St. Negritude continues to thrive in the farthest elevations of Vermont's Northeast Kingdom.

Nadine Budbill stewards her beloved late father’s body of work and creative legacy as the Literary Executor of his estate. She is also a project management and fundraising expert with 20 years of experience in the nonprofit sector, focusing on gender and racial equity, social justice, and education (passions she inherited from her social-justice-minded father). Nadine grew up in Wolcott, surrounded by the hills, back roads, trees, and people that provided the inspiration for her father’s writing.