Letters to the Moon....

Hello everyone, it is my pleasure to announce that I have published my fifth book, "El Panorama." It is the Spanish language version of my second book of poetry, “The Bigger Picture.” Now that I have published several books in both Spanish and English, I thought I would share a wonderful story with you. I have a family member who has a friend that is from Nicaragua and is now a citizen of the United States. Spanish is her native language; she can converse in English and can understand it when spoken. However, she found that she needed practice reading in English. When my family member learned of her friend's desire to learn to read in English, she gave her friend copies of my first two books in both Spanish and English. Reading both versions of the books helped her learn the language at a faster pace.  In publishing my books, I thought publishing in two languages would be a way to reach a larger number of readers, in each language. Howe...

October is National LGBT history month in the United States. Today is also National Coming Out Day I felt compelled to mark the day, to discuss some important issues. It has been a year and a half since I discovered my true sexual orientation. I am demisexual. The definition of a demisexual is: “someone who only experiences sexual attraction after a strong emotional bond has been formed with another person.”  Demisexuality is in the middle of the sexual spectrum if you will, between sexuality and asexuality.  I sometimes add a prefix to this sexual orientation: I am “hetero-demisexual.” “Hetero” being short for “heterosexual”, meaning that I am romantically and sexually attracted to the opposite sex. For more information on these terms, and my discovery of my sexual identity, I refer to you to my previous blog posts on this topic: http://letrasalaluna.blogspot.com/2016/02/speak-your-truth.html http://letrasalaluna.blogspot.com/2017/02/living-demi.html ...

To continue the Moons of the year series, here is the installment for the month of October, the Harvest Moon. The full moon for the month of October is known as the Harvest Moon. This is the time of the year when many planted crops, are harvested. Workers could work well into the night, their fields illuminated by the full moon. The Harvest Moon is usually in September, not October. However, this year, the autumnal calendar has changed. The website Space.com offers insight into this change…. “Usually, the full moon in September is known as the Harvest Moon, but this year that name is reserved for October's full moon. That's because the Harvest Moon is the full moon that falls closest to the autumnal equinox, which occurs on Sept. 22 this year.” https://www.space.com/38052-full-corn-moon-2017-rises-with-neptune-tonight.html The Farmer’s Almanac website offers different names for this moon: "Some Native American tribes referred to October’s Moon as ...

Today is the One Hundred Thousand Poets for Change event. The idea is for poets, writers, singers, composers, filmmakers, clowns, mimes, and performance artists to create a piece of art to bring about a positive change in the world. This is my third year participating in this event.  In thinking of this event in years past, I covered subjects I was passionate about, including  tolerance:  http://letrasalaluna.blogspot.com/2013/09/tolerance.html racism, sexism, islamophobia, homophobia, gun control and women’s issues: http://letrasalaluna.blogspot.com/2015/09/coexist.html This year I did not have to soul search about what topic to discuss. It is in the headlines every day in the United States. This year the topic is hatred. The title of my contribution this year is “License to Hate.” License to Hate Hatred is an iniquitous force of darkness in humanity. Hatred between one another, as well has hatred on both a national and a global scale. If you ...