TONIGHT SF book release party for Arlene Biala's "a thousand voices whispering" from Sampaguita Press! Arlene will be joined by guest poetas Josiah Luis Alderete, Elsa Valmidiano, Lorenz Dumuk, Ellie Lopez, Norman Zelaya, and musicians Jimmy Biala and Chris Trinidad. Books will be available for sale & signing. Rumor is THERE WILL BE LUMPIA for pesos donations, all proceeds to Medicine for Nightmares.
Arlene Biala is a Pinay writer from the San Francisco Bay Area who has been participating in poetry performances and workshops for over 30 years. She is a 2023-2026 Lucas Artist Residency Fellow in Literary Arts at the Montalvo Arts Center and was Poet Laureate of Santa Clara County for 2016 and 2017. She is the author of continental drift, one inch punch, and her beckoning hands, which won the 2015 American Book Award. Her latest book is a thousand voices whispering from Sampaguita Press, November 2025. Her poems are prayer flags offered to those whose stories have been silenced, hidden, and ignored. Arlene’s work centers on stories of family, of generations who have left their native lands to live in diaspora, particularly those from the Philippines. She writes poetry to serve as witness, to create space for recognition and dialogue toward healing.
Josiah Luis Alderete is a full blooded pocho left handed callejero de Aztlan. He is the curator and host of the long running Latine reading series Speaking Axolotl and currently co-tends the Portal on 24th street known as Medicine For Nightmares. His poesia has appeared in the past present and future and is currently available to anyone with smoking mirror pay per view.
Elsa Valmidiano is an Ilocana-American essayist and poet, Philippine-born and LA-raised, and a long-time resident of the San Francisco Bay Area.Elsa’s debut essay collection from New Rivers Press, We Are No Longer Babaylan, was an Editors’ Choice selection from their Many Voices Project competition in Prose and was a finalist for the Big Other Book Award for Nonfiction. Her second essay collection, The Beginning of Leaving, was published by Querencia Press, and was recognized as part of the American Writers Museum’s Filipino American History Month Reading List for Memoirs. Her essay collections have been featured and reviewed in RHINO, Rain Taxi, Pacific Daily News, Women Who Submit, Tiny Spoon, Anti-Heroin Chic, Marías at Sampaguitas, Halo-Halo Review, and HOME MADE.
Lorenz Mazon Dumuk is a poet, spoken word artist, and curator. He is a VONA alumni, and a MALI (Multicultural Arts Leadership Institute) alumni. His book collections of poetry are Ay Nako: Writing Through the Struggle, Think in Poetry, and Held (Sampaguita Press, 2025) Lorenz has curated various events such as ReWrite Open Mic, Glowing with the Moon, and the Eastridge Open Mic. His wish to create a nourishing experience at his events pushes his desire to connect communities and their people.
Ellie Lopez (she/her) is a photographer & storyteller from the 209. She is a community college dropout and failed music journalist. When she’s not ear hustling for the best chismes she writes poetry about grief, pop culture, family chismes. Her work has been published in Sin Cesar (formally DRYLAND), Marías at Sampaguitas, and CWAA Fresno Flies, Cockroaches & Poets. Ellie’s chapbook BuiLit Zine “While in Mourning” was released in August 2024. CHILLONA, her first full-length book, was published by Sampaguita Press, 2025.
Norman Antonio Zelaya is the author of two collections of short fiction, Orlando & Other Stories (Pochino Press, 2017), and Gente/Folks (Black Freighter Press, 2022). His work has appeared in ZYZZYVA, Apogee Journal, NY Tyrant, 14 Hills, Cipactli, and was a finalist for the Zoetrope: All-Story fiction contest in 2015. Also, he curates and hosts the Lunada Literary Lounge at Galería de la raza. All My Cholo Saints is forthcoming from El Martillo Press. Norman lives and writes in the MIssion District, San Francisco.
Jimmy Biala is a professional music educator, performing and recording artist. He teaches specialized programs in Cuban and Brazilian percussion in the south bay area including classes at the School of Arts and Culture in the Mexican Heritage Plaza, elementary schools in San Jose Unified and Evergreen Unified school districts and at Santa Clara University. He is a faculty member of the California Brazil Camp. Aside from teaching, Jimmy performs playing drum set and percussion with several music ensembles in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is the founder of the group Bloco do Sol San José, a percussion and dance ensemble dedicated to the development and performance of samba from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Jimmy has paraded with the Portela and Beija-Flor Samba schools and is an official ritmista da bateria member of the Beija-Flor escola de samba in Nilópolis, Rio de Janeiro.
Chris Trinidad is a Filipino-Canadian musician, teacher, multi-instrumentalist and scholar. Co-presenting a regular Asian-American jazz showcase in South San Francisco’s Sky Café with tenor saxophonist Francis Wong, Trinidad seeks to build community through music. In recent years he’s collaborated with an illustrious array of improvisers, from Spanish pianist Alex Condé, saxophonist Charlie Gurke, Grammy Award-winning pianist Christian Tumalan and veteran drummer David Rokeach. Whether he’s playing drums, bass guitar, keyboards, or singing, Trinidad creates music that sparks the imagination and soothes the soul.