“Mine is not an obedient writing. I think that literature as any art has to be irreverent”. 

These are the words of Reinaldo Arenas, one of Cuba’s most famous and controversial authors. Arenas is most known for his memoir Before Night Falls, which recounts his experiences and tribulations as a gay intellectual in Cuba under both Batista and Castro’s regimes. On March 27 2015, Galería de la Raza hosted an event dedicated to the reading of excerpts of banned books written by people of color and Maya Chinchilla, a local Bay Area writer, energetically read excerpts from the memoir that addressed the rampant censorship that Arenas and his “disobedient” and “irreverent” writing experienced due to the ideologies of Castro’s regime.

Almost 60 years later, it is regrettable that queer literature is still not part of the mainstream today–especially literature that is written by queer Latin Americans and Xicanxs. A select few authors like Reinaldo Arenas are able to break the mold and gain exposure, but what about current smaller-name authors who are trying to share their work and experiences as queer Xicanxs with the public?

Penguin Classics. Oxford Press. Random House. Books are a part of everyday life, yet we don’t always recognize the importance of publishing companies. We may recognize the names such as those previously mentioned; but do we ever think of whether certain publishing groups have a specific role and function?

Maya Chinchilla herself is a member of a very unique publishing group: Kórima Press. Based here in San Francisco, Kórima Press is, according to their website, ”an independent publisher committed to Queer Ch/Xicana and Ch/Xicano literary art”. It borrows its name from Rarámuri/Tahumara tradition, where kórima is the term to describe the concept of sharing that is so important to this Native American group of people in Northwest Mexico. It is clearly an apt name, since although Kórima Press is based here in San Francisco, it has published the works of queer Xicanx authors all over the States, including New Mexico, Texas, and Illinois. In other words, conservative states where it may be harder for queer authors gain a major audience for their work and thus have a harder time to get published by less specialized publishing groups unlike Kórima Press.

Founded by San Francisco resident Lorenzo Herrera y Lozano, Kórima Press publishes fiction and, primarily, poetry. In a society where the literary mainstream seems to be dominated by straight and/or white authors, Kórima Press serves as an important platform that allows queer Xicanxs to be published and share their creativity/works on a more widespread level than if their work were to be unpublished. The poems, novels and stories of Kórima authors expose us to the experiences of a marginalized group as well as allow us to hear their own voices regarding what it means to be both queer and Xicanx. Lorenzo Herrera y Lozano, for example, uses his poems to explore the themes of identity, sexuality, desire that are so prevalent in queer literature.

As an example, included is an excerpt from his poem titled “God is Brown”:

The color of god, the bowl of Chac Mool
Legs of a musician strumming my sighs
Celestial as stars, mundane as a smile.
Holding more meaning than X holds in sounds.

The color of love traced on a man's thigh.
The one who is seeking, the one who is found.
Color de libertad, of borderless bodies,
of borderless writers, of borderless hope.
The color of us. 

As one can see, this short excerpt uses Mexican imagery to convey Herrera y Lozano’s own desire and identity–not only as someone who is same-sex loving but also someone who is a writer. Also, the use of both English and Spanish emphasizes his experiences as a Xicanx whose identity draws upon more than just one culture. The last 3 stanzas of the poem clearly exemplify Kórima Press’ mission as an inclusive publishing group that serves to cater to queer Xixanx authors and allow them to share their work with others.

In an interview given with Pterodáctilo, the University of Texas’ Spanish language art, literature and culture magazine, Herrera y Lozano expresses the importance of having an inclusive platform like Kórima Press that is specifically for the use of queer Xixanx. He argues that the last thing he wants is to become a person that has to be normalized and approved by a society that for decades has subjugated homosexuals simply for practicing a different kind of love.

“I have found myself somewhat disappointed with this obsession to normalize the experience of those of us who have made the conscious decision to be different in the way we express our desires, our loves, and our values”
(This excerpt has been translated into English from the original Spanish interview. Click here to read the entire conversation on Pterodáctilo).

Aside from Lorenzo Herrera y Lozano, Kórima Press is home to over 10 queer and/or Xicanx authors located all over the U.S.A. Maya Chinchilla, for example “writes and performs poetry that explores themes of historical memory, heartbreak, tenderness, sexuality, and alternative futures. Her work “draws on the tradition of truth-telling and poking fun at the wounds we carry”. If you are interested in scoping out Kórima Press for yourself and perhaps order a book or two, you can visit the Kórima Press website here.