I’m excited to share that we now have an updated pub date of Jan 29th, 2024 for my new collection, THE ICE BENEATH THE EARTH. It won the C&R Press Summer Tidepool Competition, and since expanded. You can read more about at the publisher’s website.
I'm happy to share that my new poetry manuscript is coming out soon. THE ICE BENEATH THE EARTH grew out of a lengthy chapbook that won the C&R Press Summer Tidepool Competition in poetry and has since been expanded.
The poems in it weave many of the same themes and personas of my previous collections--most recently AMBUSCADE-- featuring voices of members of the Navarro clan. Some poems are set in the Philippines and draw upon my memories of experiences from decades ago, while others grew out of my experience as a father and caregiver and with medicine and illness.
I've dealt with a lot of hospitals in my life due to my son's disease. (And I also once worked in the emergency room of an inner city hospital in LA). But the first poem written -- "After the Occupation" -- grew out of my experiences in a Manila hospital decades ago. It originally appeared in The Iowa Review. Set in a hospital in Makati (Manila) during the 1990's, writing it was my way of dealing with the emotional aftermath of a month I basically spent in the ICU while my grandmother was on a respirator. One late night, my tita snuck in a faith healing nun. This giant woman in shimmering electric blue habit was rather famous, exuded the stage presence of a diva, and many pilgrims would travel to her rural church each week and line up to experience her healing. Yet she traveled to Manila just to see my grandmother. I was a skeptic--and an atheist--until that night.
THE ICE BENEATH THE EARTH is due to be released January 29th, 2024. The cover was designed by my sister, Carla Roley.
