Today we are joined by José Olivarez. José is an award-winning poet and is also an educator, developing writing courses and poetry workshops. He recently released his debut book of poetry Citizen Illegal, which is fantastic and which pulls the reader into the liminal and hyphenated spaces José has inhabited growing up in Chicago as the son Mexican immigrants to the US.

In our conversation we talk about the power of poetry both in and out of formal poems, we discuss poetry’s relation to the good, the true, and the beautiful, and José even graciously performs one my favorite poems from his book.

José Olivarez Official

Citizen Illegal Book

José on Twitter

José on Instagram

Carry the Fire Podcast Website

Instagram 

Twitter

Produced by Andy Lara at www.andylikeswords.com