Many cultures believe that the Ancestors watch over us and help us achieve our purpose in life. Identity Poetry uses ancestral memory, family traditions, custom, and secrets, as well as language, heritage, and heredity to honor those who came before us. Who we are and what we write in this workshop is intended to thank the Ancestors for their gifts to us and share them with each other.
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About Maritza Rivera
Maritza Rivera is a Puerto Rican poet and Army veteran who has lived in Rockville, MD since 1994. She founded the weekly Mariposa Poetry Series, which ran from September 1999 to October 2002 in College Park, MD and hosts the annual Mariposa Poetry Retreat at the Capital Retreat Center in Waynesboro, PA . Maritza is the author of About You, a collection of poetry “for women and the men they love”; A Mother’s War, written during her son’s two tours in Iraq; Baker’s Dozen, a limited edition in the Brazilian Cordel tradition created for the 2013 Seeing Food art exhibit in Silver Spring, MD and Twenty-One: Blackjack Poems. Maritza is also a supporter of the Memorial Day Writers Project (MDWP); participated in the Warrior Poetry Project at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, MD; and served on the Board of Directors of Split This Rock. She was the recipient of a 2012 BID International Writing Fellowship in Bahia, Brazil, and FY 2016 grant recipient of the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County. Maritza Rivera is also the publisher of Casa Mariposa Press.
Teaching style: Maritza has a collaborative spirit. Participants of her class will read and share their own experiences and work. Discussions about selected themes are intended to spark new work.
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