A Conversation with Adela Najarro
Embark on an evocative journey through “split geographies” with poet Adela Najarro in an oral history interview with director of Letras Latinas Francisco Aragón ’03 MFA. From the boarding houses of mid-century San Francisco to the classrooms of Los Angeles, experience how deep ties to family history transform into precise, body-centered poetry. Discover a narrative of motherly and grandmotherly resilience that bridges Nicaraguan heritage with the American literary landscape.
Experience the Episode
Presented by Institute for Latino Studies
Embark on an evocative journey through “split geographies” with poet Adela Najarro in an oral history interview with director of Letras Latinas Francisco Aragón ’03 MFA. From the boarding houses of mid-century San Francisco to the classrooms of Los Angeles, experience how deep ties to family history transform into precise, body-centered poetry. Discover a narrative of motherly and grandmotherly resilience that bridges Nicaraguan heritage with the American literary landscape.
Najarro will be in residence with Letras Latinas and the Raclin Murphy Museum Art in mid-March 2026 to continue “Poets & Art: Ekphrasis at the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art,” a multi-year partnership between the Museum and Letras Latinas. In addition to her poetry reading on Wednesday, March 18 at 5:30 p.m., She will spend two days at the Museum observing, reflecting, and writing a new ekphrastic poem inspired by an artwork on display. Najarro will also lead a community-focused ekphrastic writing workshop on Saturday, March 21 at 1:00 p.m. For more information, please visit the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art website.
For more information on Letras Latinas at the Institute for Latino Studies, please visit the Letras Latinas website.
Meet the Poet: Adela Najarro
Adela Najarro is the author of four poetry collections: Split Geography, Twice Told Over, My Childrens, a chapbook that includes teaching resources, and Volcanic Interruptions, a chapbook that includes Janet Trenchard’s artwork. The Letras Latinas/ Red Hen Collaborative has selected Variations in Blue for publication in 2025.
The 2024 Int’l Latino Book Awards designated Volcanic Interruptions as an Honorable Mention in the Juan Felipe Herrera Best Poetry Book Award category. The California Arts Council recognized her as an established artist for the Central California Region and appointed her as an Individual Artist Fellow.
Adela Najarro is a poet with a social consciousness who is working on a novel. Her extended family left Nicaragua and arrived in San Francisco during the 1940s; after the fall of the Somoza regime, the last of the family settled in the Los Angeles area. She serves on the board of directors for Círculo de poetas and Writers and works with the Latinx community nationwide, promoting the intersection of creative writing and social justice.
She holds a doctorate in literature and creative writing from Western Michigan University, as well as an M.F.A. from Vermont College, and is widely published in numerous anthologies and literary magazines.
Her poetry appears in the University of Arizona Press anthology The Wind Shifts: New Latino Poetry, and she has published poems in numerous journals, including Porter Gulch Review, Acentos Review, BorderSenses, Feminist Studies, Puerto del Sol, Nimrod International Journal of Poetry & Prose, Notre Dame Review, Blue Mesa Review, Crab Orchard Review, and elsewhere. She currently calls Santa Cruz, California, home.
Poets & Art at the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art
View highlights of the inaugural September 2025 event of the Poets & Art series below: