​​Zen and the Art of Tortillera

Join us for a book release and poetry reading with Poet Caridad Moro-Gronlier 'and friends' to celebrate the release of her debut collection Tortillera (TRP, 2021). Tortillera is filled with candid, colorful, unflinching poems - about the queer experience of coming out while Cuban. Also reading in the event are poets affiliated with Pintura: Palabra, a multi-year initiative sponsored by the Smithsonian American Art Museum, designed to promote new writing by Latino writers. Mia Leonin, Elisa Albo, Emma Trelles, Silvia Curbelo, Rita Maria Martinez, Alexandra Regalado. Francisco Aragon will also host the event as a representative of Letra Latinas/Notre Dame University.   

ABOUT TORTILLERA (TRP; 2021) - The word tortillera means lesbian in Español. The moniker is familiar to most Spanish speaking cultures, but especially particular to the Cuban experience. In most Cuban-American households to be called a tortillera (whether one is one or not) is the gravest of insults, the basest of adjectives, a cat call that whips through the air like a lash whose only intention is to wound, to scar. Many a first-generation Cubanita (the ones who are into other girls, anyway) has suffered, denied, wailed over the loaded term, but in Caridad Moro-Gronlier’s debut collection, Tortillera, she not only applies the term to herself, she owns it, drapes it over her shoulders and heralds her truth through candid, unflinching poems that address the queer experience of coming out while Cuban.

Buy the book here

Event sponsors include: FIU, The Betsy, Reading Queer, SOFLOPOJO. Supporting Women Writers in Miami (SWWIM), Letras Latinas, GMCVB LGBT Tourism, City of Miami Beach, Books&Books, TRP