PAPOLíTICO, Poems of a Political Puersuasion by Jesús Papoleto Meléndez

Award, many of the selections from Hey Yo! Yo Soy! was made into a play of the same name, and
performed at the Puerto Rican Traveling Theater in 2014.
In 1974, Meléndez’s play, “The Junkies Stole The Clock,” was the first Latino play produced by the New
York Shakespeare Festival, The Public Theatre’s Nuyorican Playwright’s Unit. It was again produced
in 1997, and directed by Veronica Caicedo (Caicedo Productions) at the Clemente Soto Vega Cultural
Center, in New York City. He also wrote the play, “An Element of Art” (El Porton Theatre Co., 1978).
Beginning in the 1970s, Meléndez began his 40-year career as a poet-facilitator in the public schools,
working at workshop programs in California and New York. Meléndez is anthologized most notably in
The Norton Anthology of Latino Literature (W.W. Norton & Company, 2011); Bum Rush the Page: A
Def Poetry Jam (Three Rivers Press, 2001); Literature and Integrated Studies – Forms of Literature
(ScottForesman/HarperCollins Publishers, 1997); Unsettling America: An Anthology of Contemporary
Multicultural Poetry (Penguin, 1994); Hojas, Revista de Talleres Literatura (Universidad Autonoma
Baja California, Tijuana, Mexico, 1986); and Puertoricaner In New York (Institute for Amerikanerika,
Universitat Nurnberg, Germany, 1979). His works were recently published in Pa’lante a La luz – Charge
Into The Light (Rogue Scholars Press, 2018), Word, An Anthology by A Gathering of the Tribes (2017),
and Manteca, An Anthology of Afro-Latin@ Poets (Arte Publico Press, 2017).
Meléndez is a NYFA Poetry Fellow (New York Foundation for the Arts, 2001), and is the recipient of
thr Pregones Theater’s 2014 Master Artist Award. He has received the Union Settlement Association
“Innovation Award” (2011), the Universes Poetic Ensemble Company Award in “Appreciation of Inspiration
& Commitment to the Development of the Company” (2006); The 1st Annual El Reverendo Pedro
Pietri Hand Award in Poetry, El Spirit Republic de Puerto Rico, El Puerto Rican Embassy (2006); The
Louis Reyes Rivera Lifetime Achievement Award, Amherst College (2004); and an Artist for Community
Enrichment (ACE) Award from the Bronx Council on the Arts (1995). Now an elder statesman of the
New York poetry scene, Meléndez has become a mentor for emerging poets and writers.
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JESÚS PAPOLETO MELÉNDEZ