Happy Release Day to Daniel Elias Galicia and STILL DESERT!

Statement from Author:

“STILL DESERT is a collection of poems about the border: a place where life is too often stunned into stillness by tragedy and the crisis that is the border itself.

In that stillness, how do we seek peace, rights for humans and animals, reconciliation, hope, survival, and healing and renewal? In these poems, racism, xenophobia, hatred, bigotry, loss, and death clash against our universal longing for love, fulfillment, empowerment, and a sense of belonging and home.

From this tension emerges a poetic desire to find a painful yet important beauty in the lived experiences of this region’s people. The collection moves through a landscape scorched by the desert sun’s oppressive heat, where each poem searches for relief, redemption, and the rare, precious gift of rain.”

More about Still Desert:

Finalist for the 2023 Button Poetry Chapbook Prize, Daniel Elias Galicia’s debut collection, Still Desert sings with histories both haunting and enchanting.

Artistically and linguistically dynamic, Galicia’s poems weave personal and historical narratives of immigration, assimilation, and Mexican heritage. Still Desert lingers in the spaces between borders and crossings, breathing in rich, tactile environments and raw, complex emotions. With a musical rage and a sacred love, Galicia speaks to unsung lineages and the violences found before, during, and after crossing the border.

Ash Wednesday at Ricky’s
Waiting

Like what you see? Get your copy today!

Still Desert

Performing at Rustbelt 2018

“An ode to crocs: You rubber god, you who let me walk on water and sidewalk and mountain without changing shoes. People of all ages see you on my feet and laugh.”

Don’t miss this great poem from Darius Simpson, performing at Rustbelt 2018 in Detroit, MI

Get Darius’ incredible book, Never Catch Me.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performing at Gray Area

“Color blooms through every city whether you see it or don’t, whether you seek it or don’t. So why not seek? Why not see? Why not ask yourself: Who am I looking for?”

Don’t miss this phenomenal poem from Sarah Kay, performing at Gray Area in San Francisco, CA

Get Sarah’s fantastic book, No Matter the Wreckage.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performing at WoWPS 2020

“I dig for the 12 million names of my people that could never fit in American mouths. I dig for the alphabet anglicized out of tune with the music they hid under their tongues. I dig for the names they carved out of English to sound like song again.”

Don’t miss this powerful poem from Aris Kian, performing at WoWPS 2020 in Dallas, TX

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performed in Longmont, CO

“What if we don’t have to be healed to be whole?”

Don’t miss this amazing poem from Andrea Gibson, performing in Longmont, CO

Get Andrea’s stunning book, Dead Dad Jokes.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performing at the Button Studio

“When we are both sober, I have no fucking clue what to say to him, but on the road trip, we drink cheap whiskey outside of a hot tub until we like each other.”

Don’t miss this fantastic poem from Ollie Schminkey, performing at the Button Studio in Minneapolis, MN

Get Ollie’s award-winning book, Dead Dad Jokes.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

“My soon-wife asks if we should bury a gun in the front yard, which is perhaps the opposite of a grave. A tombstone buried underneath the ground, waiting to be inscribed with a name.”

Don’t miss this week’s Best of Button playlist, featuring the top-viewed recent videos on the Button YouTube Channel. Today’s addition: Phil Kaye! Congrats Poet!

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Dave Harris, George Abraham, Natasha T. Miller, Porsha Olayiwola, L.E. Bowman, Andrea Gibson, Rachel Wiley, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performing at McNally Jackson Books

“You’re a stupid dumbass and it’s lovely and terrible, and the only person you get to be. So even if you don’t have the land, pick up the shovel, then let it go.”

Don’t miss this awesome poem from Jon Sands, performing at McNally Jackson Books in Brooklyn, NY

Get Jon’s fantastic book, The New Clean.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performing at the Button Studio

“I supply everything, even the pipe dreams. That’s why ballplayers pass the ‘rock’ and the rappers ‘cook it up’ in the lab. I’m the ‘base’line in that jazz, the ‘rock’ in their roll and I’m always in the background when shit goes up in ‘smoke.’”

Don’t miss this powerful poem from Steven Willis, performing at the Button Studio in Minneapolis, MN

Get Steven’s phenomenal book, A Peculiar People.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!

Performing at the Button Studio

“You can’t ‘beat’ death, you can only dance a little more slippery, drum a little more timelessly, hold that note beyond your breath, and hope to find a home in its echo.”

Don’t miss this great poem from Kyle “Guante” Tran Myhre, performing at the Button Studio in Minneapolis, MN

Get Kyle’s fantastic book, NOT A LOT OF REASONS TO SING, BUT ENOUGH.

While you’re here, head over to the Button store to check out our books and merch, including books by Rudy Francisco, Rachel Wiley, Dave Harris, Porsha Olayiwola, Ebony Stewart, Andrea Gibson, and our newest release from Topaz Winters!