Marjory Wentworth, the poet laureate of South Carolina, will open the 2008 Tea & Poetry series on Thursday, Jan. 17 at 3 p.m. at the Waccamaw Higher Education Center in Litchfield. Poet Ray McManus will also be featured at the event, which is free and open to the public.

Sponsored by the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Coastal Carolina University (OLLI at CCU), the poetry reading will be followed by open discussion and book signing.

Wentworth's poems have appeared in numerous books and magazines, and she has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize three times. "Noticing Eden," a collection of poems, was published in 2003. Her most recent collection, "Despite Gravity," was just published.

McManus earned a MFA in poetry in 2001 and a Ph.D. in composition and rhetoric in 2006 from the University of South Carolina. He is the author of "Driving through the country before you are born," published by USC Press in April 2007, and "Left Behind," forthcoming from Stepping Stones Press in 2008.

For a complete listing of the poetry series, visit www.coastal.edu/olli or call 349-4030.