About

Photo credit: Lauren Barry Fairchild

Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo is a first generation Chicana born and raised in San Gabriel, California, who fondly remembers weekends spent haciendo travesuras with her cousins around her grandparents’ Boyle Heights home. Her debut collection, Posada: Offerings of Witness and Refuge (Sundress Publications 2016), was written while living in a house in the shadows of Dodger Stadium in historic Solano Canyon.

Most recently, Bermejo was chosen as the first “Poet in the Parks” resident at Gettysburg National Military Park in partnership with the Poetry Foundation and the National Parks Arts Foundation. She is a former Steinbeck fellow, Poets & Writers California Writers Exchange poetry winner, Barbara Deming Memorial Fund/Money for Women grantee, Los Angeles Central Library ALOUD newer poet, and her poetry received 3rd place in the 2015 Tucson Festival of Books literary awards. She has received residencies with Hedgebrook and the Ragdale Foundation and is a proud member of the Macondo Writers’ Workshop.

Bermejo is a cofounder of Women Who Submit, a literary organization using social media and community events to empower women and non-binary authors to submit work for publication. She received a BA in Theatre Arts from California State University, Long Beach and an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University Los Angeles. She facilitates online and in-person workshops in poetry and submission strategies with UCLA Extension, Antioch University Los Angeles, Los Angeles Writing Classes as well as being available for classroom visits for university, high school, and junior high communities. She is a workshop coordinator for teen art classes with ArtworxLA.

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