Blog | Carlos Andrés Gómez

Five sublime days in the Pacific Northwest as an artist in residence

I cannot say thank you enough to the entire Chehalis Tribal Community, elders, and everyone who welcomed me and attended the event and workshop with Rena Priest. The entire day was such a gift.

These were five of the most powerful and meaningful days of this work I’ve ever been a part of. Being able to do generative writing workshops with middle schoolers, incarcerated teens, as well as non-profit and community workers meant everything.

I felt so connected to my former life as a social worker/outreach worker before I was touring, speaking, performing, and teaching full-time.

I hope to see you all again soon.

#CarlosOnTour

24 years ago today I did my first college gig

24 years ago today, a “renowned hip hop spoken word artist” did his first college show at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine.

It felt like a novel abundance from the universe that allowed me to spend a few days with my best friend and try to figure out what it would look like to put together a 45-minute set of poems for a room full of college kids.

That teenage version of me would never have believed that I’d still be touring colleges today, nearly 1,600 college and university events later.

What a wild and miraculous journey it’s been.

#CarlosOnTour

#24YearsIn

“Ghazal Circling Fatherhood” is today’s featured poem for the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series!

Feels like a dream to see my new piece that wrestles with masculinity, fatherhood, and lineage as today’s featured poem for the Academy of American Poets’ iconic Poem-a-Day series.

Heartfelt gratitude to Willie Perdomo (an impossible bar of literary brilliance & citizenship) for selecting it. I can never overstate the transformative impact of my mentors at Warren Wilson and beyond who indirectly made this poem, and all the new poems, possible.

Thank you in advance to every single person who shares, listens, reads, or teaches this poem. You can listen to a crisp studio recording of me reciting it if you click the “audio” link.

My publisher just confirmed that new copies of “Fractures” arrived in stock earlier this week, so the book order link should work (if you’ve been meaning to get it!).

Lastly, I’m lining up event dates and artist residencies for this fall now, so if you want to host me at your independent school, college, law firm, or company DM me ASAP.

Much love & gratitude,

Carlos

#PoemADay
#AcademyOfAmericanPoets
#PoemADaySeries
#CarlosOnTour

“Where Language Ends” just won the 2025 Stephen A. DiBiase Poetry Prize!!

I just got the news that the titular poem of my new poetry manuscript, “Where Language Ends,” has been named the winner of the 2025 Stephen A. DiBiase Poetry Prize.

Heartfelt thank you to the judges—Siobhan Kent, Matt Sharkey, Rus Sykes, & Habiba Dokubo-Asari—for selecting my poem from several hundred submissions. I am so honored to see my name alongside these other writers.

I’ve been in a season of brief and momentary breakthroughs, but like so many writers, mostly an almost insatiable flood of rejections, so I’m welcoming this acknowledgement of my work. It’s a poem I care a lot about, which makes this particularly meaningful.

I can never say it enough, but my unfathomably brilliant and generous friend (is not a big enough word), Adam Falkner, has offered the most vital and uncompromising feedback on all of these new poems. What a gift to have beloved friends who make me stretch to try, often in vain, to keep up with them. Without Adam, the new manuscript would not exist.

And, lastly, shoutout to Jon Sands and my Emotional Historians’ familia, with whom and during a generative workshop I drafted the initial version of this poem.

Onward.

#StephenADiBiasePoetryPrize

#WhereLanguageEnds

#EmotionalHistorians

#BackToTheWork

“Circling Fatherhood” named winner of the 2024 Poetry International Chapbook Prize!!

On my best days, I strive to be “full of tenderness and bravado.” What a tremendous honor—

Circling Fatherhood has been named the winner of the 2024 Poetry International Chapbook Prize.

This chapbook, which is excerpted from Where Language Ends, gives a sneak peek at my forthcoming full-length poetry collection and will be published as a portfolio in Issue 30 of Poetry International later this year. I cannot wait for you to read these poems.

My heartfelt gratitude to Sandra Alcosser, Blas Falconer, Meagan Marshall, Piotr Florcyzk, Alejandra Hernández, Luis Torres, & the entire Poetry International Editorial Board. I was completely flabbergasted by this news.

Welcoming in every little bit of light right now.

#CirclingFatherhood
#WhereLanguageEnds
#PoetryInternational
#PoetryInternationalChapbookPrize
#BackToWork