La Palabra Series: Noche de Voces en Resistencia: Chican@ Affirmation
Exhibición and Reception featuring work from 18th Street Casa de Cultura’s paper maché class: Xochipilli
Political Poets of the Midwest and the West Read from their Latest Works, Moderated by Jacqueline Serrato, Journalist and Editor-in-chief, South Side Weekly
Open Mic on “Working Class Struggle”
Send submissions of work to be shared (English or Spanish, etc.) (submit political poems no longer than 4 minutes to 18casadecultura@gmail.com. Works selected will be notified ahead of time for inclusion in the program
FEATURED POETS:
MATT SEDILLO
Los Angeles poet Matt Sedillo is literary director of the Instituto Cultural Mexicano - Los Angeles. Described as “the best political poet in America” and “the poet laureate of struggle," he has shared his work widely across the U.S., Mexico, Canada, Cuba, the U.K., Italy and France. His published works include Mowing Leaves of Grass (2019), and City on the Second Floor, (2022) Flowersong Press.
https://www.mattsedillo.com/
CARLOS CUMPIAN
Carlos Cumpián a Chicagoan originally from Texas. Human Cicada marks his fifth poetry collection: Coyote Sun (March Abrazo Press), Latino Rainbow (Children’s Press/Scholastic Books) Armadillo Charm (Tia Chucha Press), and 14 Abriles: Poems. In 2000, he was recognized with a Gwendolyn Brooks Significant Illinois Poet Award. Cumpián has been included in more than thirty poetry anthologies, including the Norton Anthology Telling Stories. Before becoming a teacher, he worked with various social service organizations such as ASPIRA and public relations for the Chicago Public Library. Cumpián has taught creative writing and poetry through community arts organizations including the National Museum of Mexican Art, Urban Gateways and as a writer-in residence funded by the Illinois Arts Council. Cumpián taught in the English Department of Columbia College Chicago and in the Chicago Public School and Charter school system. In addition, he has hosted live readings with Galeria Qui Que & La Palabra Series and published over 20 poets/writers with MARCH ABRAZO PRESS between 1978-2015. His most recent essay, “Learned to Read at My Momma’s Knee,” appears in With a Book in Their Hands: Chicano/a Readers and Readerships Across the Centuries (University of New Mexico Press, 2014). His first in a series of true supernatural accounts, “A Chicago Premonition” was published in Hombre Lobo #2, True Xicanax Spooky Stories, (Ponte Las Pilas Press, Los Angles, Ca. 2021) Cumpián is currently working on his “anti-war years” memoir Accidental Rebel: 1968-1976.
