Happy Release Day to Chelsea Guevara and CIPOTA!

From Chelsea about Cipota

My book Cipota is written and edited and available to the world today. It is a collection of stories from Salvi girlhood in the diaspora, notes on my own navigation of life and relationships, and lessons on becoming more sure of myself while also being less sure about the future.

This book is a product of love made possible by my families and communities who pour into me everyday, and I’m in giddy shock every time I read my name on the spine.

Working with Button Poetry to develop this collection has been so much dreamier than I could have ever wished for. I’m so grateful to work with a team that truly cares about my relationship to the work, and has provided their constant support, expertise, and vision into making this real and beautiful.

To everyone who has been a part of this process with me, I love you and thank you so much.

To anyone who asks me how I’m doing today, I’m releasing my first book 🙂 and you should get a copy or two here <3 – Chelsea Guevara

More about Cipota

Chelsea Guevara’s Cipota breathes a lineage into a song—making music of ancestral memory: dirges of heartbreak and generational trauma, anthems of rage and reclamation, ballads of love and homecoming.

Guevara’s voice enchants as she delves into history, ancestry, and the self—reaching for a lineage that has been battered by strife and strangled by colonialism. She moves through place and memory with deft skill and earnest humanity. Cipota examines the grief of culture lost, of a home you’ve been separated from, one that doesn’t truly feel like yours. 

Cipota is a beating heart that demands to be heard. You will be rapt from start to finish.

Get your copy today!

Buy CIPOTA

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!