"Mérida from the roof" drawing and watercolor by Elizabeth Bishop, 1942
About USPiM
We
bring a faculty of four or five poets to Mexico to
conduct workshops and give free public readings. Established and emerging Mexican poets are
invited to give readings and conduct workshops. I decided to award five
scholarships to poets and writers in each state in Mexico where we will hold our workshops, to participate free of charge in
the workshops in order to integrate our program with communities and
broaden the opportunity for collaborations. Beginning in 2010, the Mérida
Fellowship Award will be awarded to one American poet (a U.S. citizen)
to participate in all program activities free of charge. The Mérida Fellow will give a reading on the same evening as one of our faculty members.
We provide a supportive writers' community for participants. Poets can expect a productive and intimate program with no more than eight persons in each workshop. Workshops include poetry in all of its forms and manifestations and generally do not concentrate on reworking existing poems. New works and collaborations between participants, faculty and featured readers are encouraged. With our first day orientation breakfast, day trip and evening cocktail hour, everyone becomes better acquainted before the first day of workshops.
Our journal, Pyramid, publishes poems by current participants and we hope to publish the journal with a better binding in the near future.
We arrange Spanish lessons for participants. Workshops are primarily conducted in English, with at least two bilingual faculty members each year. Featured Mexican poets will conduct bi-lingual workshops. Readings are in English and Spanish (and some indigenous languages with Spanish and English translations).
Post-program readings by participants and faculty are arranged in NYC and L.A. and expanding these readings to smaller cities in the U.S. will be a goal for our future.
Aside from our website pages, our quarterly email newsletters and our new blog will keep everyone abreast of our events, Residencies and participant and faculty news.
Visit our Event Archives section to get an overview of our January, 2009 and 2010 events.
Our Translation and Writing Residencies in Mexico will arrange for poets to reside in a colonial city in Mexico in order to work on translations of poems or create new work, to be published by non-profit publishing partners. Select Translation Residencies will be filmed as part of our ongoing film series, Two Voices and One Vision (dos voces y una visión).
We promise an exciting exploration of the voices, minds and hearts of both nations.
Sheila Lanham, Director
U. S. Poets in Mexico
About our logo: The Maya hieroglyph AJ tz'i-b'a (aj tz'iib') (pronounced tz' éeeb) meaning "he of the writing," or "scribe"; designates the occupation of scribe.