Pat Mora

Pat Mora is an award-winning author of more than forty volumes of poetry, nonfiction, and children's picture books.

"Ms. Mora's poems are proudly bilingual, an eloquent answer to purists who refuse to see language as something that lives and changes," wrote The New York Times of Pat Mora's poetry collection, Agua Santa: Holy Water.  Her most recent collection is Dizzy in Your Eyes: Poems about Love (Knopf, 2010) written in the voices of teens.  Other collections include Adobe Odes, Aunt Carmen's Book of Practical Saints and four published by Arte Público Press: Communion, Borders, Chants and My Own True Name: New and Selected Poems for Young Adults.

Pat received Honorary Doctorates in Letters from North Carolina State University and SUNY Buffalo and is an Honorary Member of the American Library Association. A former teacher, university administrator, consultant and the author of many award-winning children's books, Pat is the founder of the family literacy initiative El día de los niños / El día de los libros, Children's Day / Book Day (Día), now housed at the American Library Association.  The year-long commitment to linking all children to books, languages and cultures, and of sharing what Pat calls "bookjoy," culminates in celebrations across the country in April.

A native of El Paso, the border city to which her grandparents came during the Mexican Revolution, Pat Mora speaks often at conferences, universities, and schools about creative writing, leadership, diversity, heritage and multicultural education. The mother of three adult children, Pat is married to Vern Scarborough and lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  For further information, visit www.patmora.com.