The Summer Sunset Series concludes with a reading featuring two outstanding writers published by our friends at Curbstone Press. Aracelis Girmay was born in Santa Ana, California in 1977 and raised in Southern California. She is of Eritrean, Puerto Rican, and African American descent. A former Watson fellow and Cave Canem fellow, Aracelis has published extensively in literary magazines. She has led writing workshops in numerous public schools, colleges, and arts centers.

The poems in her book Teeth are stunning, highly original poems that celebrate the richness of the author’s multicultural heritage. The book explores loves, wars, wild hope, defiance, and the spirit of creativity in a daring use of language and syntax. Behind this language one senses a powerful, inventive woman who is not afraid to tackle any subject, including rape, genocide, and love, always sustained by an optimistic voice, assuring us that in the end, justice will triumph and love will persevere.

Nicholasa Mohr comments, “the poems of Aracelis Girmay ring out with a burning truth as she transports the reader into the world of despair, discrimination, sorrows, triumphs, joy and the courage it takes to flourish as a woman of color. Her keen observations are put forth with an appetite for life without fear or self-consciousness as she weaves her words into a range of potent poems.”

Born in the Dominican Republic and raised in the Bronx, Annecy Baez currently lives in Westchester County, New York. A poet and fiction writer, Baez’s literary work has appeared in Caudal, a Dominican journal, Tertuliando/Hanging Out, a bilingual anthology, and Callaloo. She is a psychotherapist by training, and she holds a doctoral degree in clinical social work. Presently, Annecy is the Director of the Counseling Center at Lehman College.

My Daughter’s Eyes and Other Stories, to be published in July 2007, is the winner of the 2007 Miguel Mármol Prize, a prize for a first work of fiction in English by a Latina/o writer that reflects a respect for intercultural understanding and fosters an appreciation for human rights and civil liberties. This is a collection of fourteen interrelated stories about young Dominican women living in the Bronx and dealing with the choices of everyday life. These stories span three decades, beginning in the 1970’s, and their topics range from mother-daughter struggles, father-daughter betrayal, family, child abuse, to emerging sexuality, love, loss, and healing.

All readings include a question & answer period and a reception with books by the author(s) for sale.

Suggested Donation: $5 ($3 for HVWC members and those under age 18)

Programs and events at The Hudson Valley Writers’ Center are made possible, in part, by grants from the Bydale Foundation, the David G. Taft Foundation, the Orchard Foundation, and the Thendara Foundation; with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts; and by the Basic Program Support Grant of the Westchester Arts Council with funds from Westchester County Government.

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