Naomi Ortiz
Poet, Writer & Visual Artist
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Naomi Ortiz is a poet, writer, and visual artist whose intersectional work focuses on self-care for activists, disability justice, climate action, and relationship with place. They are the author of Sustaining Spirit: Self-Care for Social Justice, a nonfiction book published by Reclamation Press that delves into self-care tools and strategies for diverse communities. Their poetry/prose collection, Rituals for Climate Change: A Crip Struggle for Ecojustice, is forthcoming with Punctum Books and explores how climate change impacts connection to place, expands on and complicates who is seen as an environmentalist, and reimagines relationship with the land.
Ortiz is a 2021-2022 Border Narrative Grant awardee for their multidisciplinary project “Complicating Conversations.” They are a Zoeglossia Poetry Fellow whose poems have been nominated for “Best of the Internet” and listed on Entropy’s “Best of 2020-2021: Favorite Poems Published Online.” Ortiz emphasizes interdependence, inclusion, and spiritual growth in their talks, workshops, poetry, and writing. Their visual art has been shown through a variety of venues, including in the Syracuse Cultural Workers 2022 Peace Calendar. Ortiz first performed their poetry at the 2004 Inaugural Disability Pride Parade in Chicago and has continued at events across the country. As a Disabled Mestizx living in the Arizona U.S./Mexico borderlands, they are passionate about organizing with the Southern Arizona Community Care Collective/Colectivo de Beinestar Comunitario.