By Deborah Spector
FROM: LAPL Blog

Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo is author of Posada: Offerings of Witness and Refuge (Sundress Publications 2016). A former Steinbeck Fellow and Poets & Writers California Writers Exchange winner, most recently, her poem, “Battlegrounds” was featured at Poets.org and On Being’s Poetry Unbound. She’s the director of Women Who Submit, a literary organization fighting for gender parity in publishing.

Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo will be one of the featured authors at the Los Angeles Libros Festival, a free bilingual book festival for the whole family. L.A. Libros Fest will be streamed live on YouTube on Friday, September 23, from 9 a.m. to 12 noon. The Festival will be in-person at Central Library in Downtown Los Angeles on Saturday, September 24, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., with select Saturday programs streamed live on YouTube.

Our tagline this year is Read, Dream and Celebrate en dos idiomas. How do you think your books and stories help us accomplish this?

My book, Posada: Offerings of Witness and Refuge uses Spanglish. I’m a daughter of Mexican immigrants, and though I am not fluent in Spanish, like many children of immigrants, it’s a language I can understand better than speak, and it’s a language that weaves in and out of my life at all and any times. Certain poems in the collection work to illustrate what this kind of experience with Spanish can feel or look like. Other poems remember that language is one way we connect to others and tries to make that connection a little more clear. Language can be an important lifeline, especially in traumatic situations. I do have one poem in the book that is in both English and Spanish. I wrote that poem for my grandmother who only spoke Spanish. She would often ask me to write in Spanish. Unfortunately, I only got around to writing it after she passed. Read Rest of Interview Here