Letras Latinas at the University of Notre Dame’s Institute for Latino Studies in Notre Dame, Indiana, in partnership with Poets Against Walls collective based in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, will host a virtual public dialogue and reading on March 31, 2021 with Michelle Otero and Valerie Martinez, recent Poet Laureate of Albuquerque, NM 2018-2020 and Poet Laureate of Santa Fe, NM 2008 - 2010, respectively.

Michelle Otero and Valerie Martinez engage in a virtual public dialogue and reading, sharing how their work, both as artists and community-based cultural workers, has shaped their engagement in their particular communities. This conversation will also serve as a forum to discuss the poetics that undergird Otero’s recently published book, Bosque (University of New Mexico, 2021).

Michelle Otero served as the Poet Laureate of Albuquerque from 2018-2020. She is the author of the essay collection Malinche’s Daughter, the poetry collection Bosque, and the forthcoming Vessels: A Memoir of Borders. Originally from Deming, New Mexico, she holds a B.A. in History from Harvard College and an MFA in Creative Writing from Vermont College. She is a member of Macondo Writers' Workshop.

Valerie Martínez is a poet, educator, arts administrator, and collaborative artist. After a twenty-two year career as a college and university professor, Valerie became a core artist with Littleglobe, Inc. Subsequently, she founded Artful Life which is dedicated to transforming communities through place-based, collaborative art. She has extensive experience with large-scale arts and community engagement projects involving hundreds of neighborhood residents and professional artists. Valerie is also an eco-artist; she, Bobbe Besold and Dominique Mazeaud walked the length of the endangered Santa Fe River (54 miles from 11,000 feet in the upper watershed to the rivers confluence with the Rio Grande) in 2012 for the Rivers Run Through Us project.

This year, the more than 25 organizations nationwide that compose the Poetry Coalition will launch “It is burning./ It is dreaming./ It is waking up.: Poetry & Environmental Justice”, the coalition’s fifth annual programming initiative. For this collaborative effort, the organizations will offer a range of virtual programs that speak to this timely theme. This programming is made possible in part by grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Ford Foundation which were secured by the Academy of American Poets.

The line “It is burning./ It is dreaming./ It is waking up.” is from the poem “Map” by Linda Hogan.

Poetry Coalition members aim to demonstrate how poetry can positively provoke questions in their communities about environmental justice and spark increased engagement with this urgent topic. Each member organization has committed to offer programming that is accessible and that includes poets from the disability community, and of specific racial, ethnic, and gender identities, backgrounds, and communities.

All organizations and others interested are invited to program on this theme in 2021 and share their efforts using the hashtags #EnvironmentalJustice and #PoetryCoalition.

You may view this event via Zoom Webinar or watch it live on the Poets Against Walls Facebook Live page.

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