Book Release: On The Edge of Immobility by Maria d. Duarte Ortiz

Join us for the in-person release of Maria D. Duarte Ortiz's On The Edge of Immobility! 

Click "Get Tickets" to RSVP & pre-order your copy to pick up at the event.
Limited copies available for purchase at the day of the event.

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About Maria D. Duarte Ortiz:

Maria D. Duarte Ortiz is a poet, creative and writer who received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of California, Riverside-Palm Desert. She has published poems in Verdad Magazine from Long Beach City College, in the anthology The Good Grief Journal: A Journey Toward Healing, in the anthology Here to Stay: Poetry and Prose from the Undocumented Diaspora, Los Angeles Poetry Beach 2022 and Kelp Journal. Her personal essay “Dear America” appears in Alta Journal and her Op-ed “As a ‘Dreamer,’ I’m never not afraid” appeared in the LA Times. Her book, "Into the Blue" was published by Kelp Books. She is currently the poetry editor for Kelp Journal and a CLI Alumna. 

About On The Edge of Immobility:

This poetry collection was born after years of keeping my poems hidden, though writing has always been an inseparable part of who I am. I never truly had the choice not to write, it has always felt like both a calling and a necessity. These poems demanded to be seen, to live outside of me, and I could no longer deny them the light. My father once challenged me to put a book together, perhaps not as a dare, but as the gentle push I needed to finally embrace what I’ve always been: a writer, a poet, a dreamer, an illusionist of words, a truth-teller of my own being. Within these pages, I share stories that do more than reveal the fine lines of emotion, they search for meaning, connection, and self.

Praise for "On The Edge of Immobility"

Maria d. Duarte Ortiz’s “On the Edge of Immobility” is best described as a beautiful ache for the heart. Within each piece of her poetry, I discovered faith, solitude and the universal experience of loneliness—stitched together like a handmade quilt.

In “The Ranch,” I found refuge in the solemnity of the present and the bittersweet burden of memory. Later, in “Remembering” and “The Rhapsody of Dying,” I encountered a living organism that resembled humanity itself. “Mirage” offered a devastation that hurt me sweetly, followed by the cold fingertips of lovers who flickered and faded. I’m especially struck by how Duarte Ortiz portrays grief—for the self, for the past. It resonates like a bell ringing muted in my ribcage. Her poems, as a whole, feel like a lungful of cold mountain air: bracing, breathtaking, and lonely. You’re the only one at the top, and there’s no one there to share it with. If you’re searching for a voice that mirrors the shape of your own losses, whether in love or in that inconsolable, nameless blue ache of simply being, look no further. My favorite stanza comes from “The Rhapsody of Dying:”

“I could dance on top of a fire and char my feet, but the pain of discovering your existence cannot be erased.”

--Leslie Gonzalez

"In poetry brimming with love, life, and loss Ortiz excavates life's absurdities with a wary and diligent eye. Evoking notes of Passoa and Neruda these poems plumb the depths of the human soul with its sadness, trauma, and above all, hope."

--David M. Olsen, Author | Editor-in-Chief of Kelp Books