Selected by Poets & Writers Magazine as a 2014 Notable Debut Poet, poet-

dramatist Cindy Williams Gutiérrez draws inspiration from the silent and silenced 

voices of history and herstory. Her poetry collection, the small claim of bones 

published by Bilingual Press, is a finalist for the 2015 International Latino Book 

Awards. Her CD “Emerald Heart” features her Aztec-inspired poems accompanied 

by pre-Hispanic music. Poems and reviews have appeared in Borderlands, Calyx, 

Harvard’s Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, the Universidad Nacional 

Autónoma de México’s Periódico de poesía, Portland Review, Quiddity, Rain Taxi, 

Rattle, and ZYZZYVA. Plays include Words That Burn which premiered at Milagro 

Theatre in 2014 to commemorate the William Stafford Centennial and Hispanic 

Heritage Month, and A Dialogue of Flower & Song featured in the 2012 GEMELA 

(Spanish and Latin American Women’s Studies) Conference co-sponsored by the 

University of Portland and Portland State University. 

Cindy earned an MFA from the University of Southern Maine Stonecoast Program 

with concentrations in Mesoamerican poetics and creative collaboration. A 

passionate educator, she has taught poetry to K-12 youth through the Portland 

Art Museum, the Right Brain Initiative, and Writers in the Schools as well as to 

adults through Literary Arts’ Delve Seminars, the Oregon Council for Teachers of 

English, and the Stonecoast MFA Program. Cindy is a founding member of Los 

Porteños, Portland’s Latino writers’ collective, and the founder of Grupo de ’08, a 

Northwest collaborative-artists’ salon inspired by Lorca’s Generación de ’27.