State poet laureate Claudia Castro Luna will lead a workshop and read selections of her poetry next week in Winthrop.
Washington state poet laureate Claudia Castro Luna will offer a poetry workshop next Tuesday (Sept. 25) and a reading of her poetry on Thursday (Sept. 27) at Trail’s End Bookstore in Winthrop.
The site of the workshop, which is free and open to the public, was yet to be determined at press time; it will be from 5-6:30 p.m. The Thursday reading will be from 5:30-7 p.m.
Castro Luna will be leading poetry residencies, workshops and public readings in Okanogan County through September. She will lead poetry residencies for students at Liberty Bell Junior/Senior High, Okanogan Middle/High, and Brewster Junior/Senior High.
Castro Luna succeeds former Washington state poet laureate Tod Marshall, who visited Okanogan County and the Methow Valley several times to work with students and members of the public.
In 1981 as a teen, Castro Luna fled war-stricken El Salvador and immigrated to the United States with her family, later earning an MFA in poetry and an MA in urban planning. She now writes and teaches in English and Spanish in Seattle.
“As the first immigrant and woman of color to assume the role, Castro Luna will be advocating for poetry during a particularly fraught period for both the humanities (the current administration proposed eliminating the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities early this year) and immigrant populations, who are confronting uncertainty in the face of travel bans and heated rhetoric,” according to Humanities Washington, which sponsors the Washington state Poet Laureate program with ArtsWA. Castro Luna’s term as poet laureate will through Jan. 31, 2020.
To register for the workshop, call Methow Arts at 997-4004, or email info@methowartsalliance.org.
