Raquel Salas Rivera
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Poet Laureate of Philadelphia
& winner of the 2018 Ambroggio Prize! 
Raquel Salas Rivera is the 2018-19 Poet Laureate of Philadelphia. They are the author of while they sleep (under the bed is another country) from Birds, LLC and the inaugural recipient of the Ambroggio Prize from the Academy of American Poets for their book x/ex/exis. They are also the author of six chapbooks and four other full-length poetry books.
Their fourth book, lo terciario/the tertiary, was on the 2018 National Book Award Longlist, and was selected by Remezcla, Entropy, Literary Hub, mitú, Book Riot, and Publishers Weekly as one of the best poetry books of 2018. From 2016-2018, they were co-editor of The Wanderer and co-editor of Puerto Rico en mi corazón, a collection of bilingual broadsides of contemporary Puerto Rican poets. They have received fellowships and residencies from the Sundance Institute, the Kimmel Center for Performing Arts, the Arizona Poetry Center, and CantoMundo. They love and live for Puerto Rico, Philadelphia, and a world free of white supremacy. 
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Raquel Salas Rivera es la poeta laureada de la ciudad de Filadelfia del 2018-19. Es la autora de while they sleep (under the bed is another country) publicado por Birds, LLC y fue la recipiente inaugural del Ambroggio Prize de la Academia de Poetas Americanos por su libro x/ex/exis. Cuenta con la publicación de seis plaquetas y cuatro poemarios adicionales.
Su cuarto libro, lo terciario/the tertiary, fue finalista para el Premio Nacional del Libro del 2018 y fue seleccionado por Remezcla, Entropy, Literary Hub, mitú, Book Riot y Publishers Weekly como uno de los mejores poemarios del 2018. Del 2016-2018 fue co-editora de la revista literaria The Wanderer y co-editora de Puerto Rico en mi corazón, una colección bilingüe de volantes de poetas puertorriqueños contemporáneos. Es la recipiente de becas del Sundance Institute, el Kimmel Center for Performing Arts, el Arizona Poetry Center y CantoMundo. Ama y vive por Puerto Rico, Filadelfia y un mundo libre de la supremacía blanca. 
Winning me over entirely with their fiercely rendered tenderness and emergent sense of a simultaneously tough and tender I, these poems and their speaker are, to use so simple a word for so complex a world, strong. Strong. —Alberto Ríos, winner of the Walt Whitman Award Raquel opens to us, and we join them—as friends, as family, as warriors. Their investment in strength in numbers means that collectively these poems become more and more powerful, each one drawing on the strength of the other. And this investment means that we draw power from becoming a part of Raquel’s world. Raquel calls to us “come here/ i invoke you. let’s invoke ourselves together,” and together, we do." —Carmen Giménez Smith, Boston Review "Poet's Sampler" |
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Like no poet I have ever read, Raquel Salas Rivera talks to Marx via the monstrous colonial devastation of Puerto Rico. This genius poet also speaks to Trotsky who said workers could not make art. Here is one of the most riveting, beautifully written declarative poetics of our lives! A fierce document that fully transfers its radical transformative powers into our bones! —CA Conrad, author of While Standing in Line for Death |