Chicanonautica: ¡Feliz Dead Daze, Cabrones!

by Ernest Hogan

I’ll be on the road when this comes out. Another one of the searching for America things that my wife, the fabulous Emily Devenport, and her brother Michael Thiele, do every year in memory of their mom, the late Margaret Devenport, a road tripper extraordinaire. Sometimes new traditions are in order.

Hell, sometimes new civilizations are in order, but I digress . . .

Once again, it’s happening in the last half of October, Latino/Hispanic/Chicano Heritage Month (just for the record, for me, every month is pinche Chicano Heritage Month), the lead-in to Halloween, and los Días de los Muertos, and a midterm election that promises to be . . . well, let’s not go all Nostradamus here and just say somekinda transmogrification will be going on. The Wild West will be festooned out in chingaderas both holidazical and political. Lots to see, photograph, and write about.

Some folk get upset about mixing up Halloween and the Días, and we should be aware of the two very different traditions and intents they come from, but, like I suggested in Smoking Mirror Blues, it makes for a fantastic three day celebration–¡DEAD DAZE!--that has not quite materialized yet, but we can hope.

Yeah, yeah, calaveras and Catrinas shouldn’t be Halloween costumes, and we should try to keep Disney and other corporations from appropriating it all, but holidays, like cultures, change. The Dias de los Muertos we see nowadays, with sugar skull-faced mariachis everywhere, and proud Catrinas as embodiments of female empowerment instead of the caricature of vanity that José Guadalupe Posada intended, is not the way it was done back in the 20th century. The skeletons were a Mexico City/Tenochtitlán thing. In rural Mexico it was more of a quiet remembrance of loved ones with picnics in cemeteries. By the year 2000 Chicanos north of the border made it into the multimedia spectacle that it is today.

Who knows what it’ll become in the future? My social media feeds are full of postings by young people who are living the sort of things that were far-out wackazoid sci-fi when I was writing about them back in the antediluvian Ninties. Ha-ha, dude, where do you get them crazy ideas? Somekinda genetically-enhanced peyote? Ese, can ya sell me some?

On these road trips, I keep seeing sugar skulls and Mexican restaurants beyond the borders of Aztlán. Colorful decorated skulls are seen in hip coffee shops far from any barrio. La Cultura is reaching out, growing.

Is that an onramp to the Intergalactic Barrio I see in the distance?

Chicanonauts, Xicanxfuturists, Ciberbandidxs take note. You have to build the universe you want. Slavishly conforming to not-so ancient traditions is not enough.  Imagine! Create! Make!

Ernest Hogan will be back in Arizona soon. Once again, his books, High Aztech, Smoking Mirror Blues, Cortez on Jupiter, and Guerrilla Mural of a Siren’s Song: 15 Gonzo Science Fiction Stories, are available through Amazon and now Barnes & Noble. Buy them and review them! You should vote too, while you're at it . . .

Mistaco: A Tale of Tragedy y Tortillas- ¡Mistaco! Un recuento de tragedias y tortillas

Mistaco! A Tale of Tragedy y Tortillas

Written and illustrated by Eliza Kinkz

*Publisher: Kokila

*Print length: 40 pages

*ISBN-10: 0593700236

*ISBN-13: 978-0593700235

*Reading age: 4 - 8 years

*Grade level: Preschool - 3

A chaotically funny debut picture book about a girl who's had a terrible day full of mistakes and finds that making mistacos could be a delicious solution.

After an awful day at school (including a tragic but plausibly deniable mishap with a pudding cup), Izzy wants to be left alone. But it's Friday, and that means making tortillas with Lito.

As the mistakes pile up, they come tumbling out of Izzy—and Lito surprises her by saying everyone makes mistakes, and if she makes a tortilla out of her mistakes, he will EAT it. 

"Mmmm. . .spicy! And boogery! With a hint of courage. My favorite taco EVER!" 

Suddenly, the whole family is confessing and getting mistakes off their chests with a feast of mistacos! A delightfully silly picture book for fans of Dragons Love Tacos and The Book of Mistakes. Includes instructions on how to make and enjoy your own mistacos!

¡Mistaco! Un recuento de tragedias y tortillas

Un álbum ilustrado caóticamente divertido sobre una niña que ha tenido un día terrible, lleno de mistakes, pero pronto descubre que si los convierte en mistacos podría encontrar una solución deliciosa a sus problemas.

Después de un día horrible en la escuela (incluyendo un trágico incidente con un vasito de pudding), lo único que Izzy quiere es que la dejen en paz. Pero es viernes. Eso significa que es el día de hacer tortillas con Lito. A medida que las historias de sus mistakes se acumulan, Izzy los va soltando uno por uno, y Lito la sorprende diciéndole que todos cometemos mistakes, y que si ella hace una tortilla con los suyos, él se la comerá.

“Mmmm... ¡picosa! ¡Y mocosa! Con una pizca de valentía. ¡Mi taco favorito EVER!”.

¡De repente, toda la familia empieza a confesar sus mistakes y a librarse de ellos con un festín de mistacos!

¡Un álbum ilustrado deliciosamente disparatado para los fans de Greg Pizzoli y Oh, Olive! de Lian Cho.

Review

“Pura Belpré Honor winning–illustrator Kinkz conveys a message all kids need to hear: Everyone makes mistakes, and owning them can bring relief and even joy…Kinkz has created a fully realized youngster who’s equal parts goofy exuberance and vulnerable insecurity. A deliciously effervescent celebration of family and resilience.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“[W]ith magnificently scrawled artwork, Kinkz offers a story that blends deep empathy, raucous candor, and a useful ritual for dealing with shame.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Kinkz has created a reassuring story of big feelings and belly laughs in her author-illustrator debut, no mistake about it.” —Booklist, starred review

“Every scene will invite readers closer into the pages till they’ve found every burp, fart, and poop joke, and terrific asides… There are no mistakes in these pages, just an SEL lesson writ large, delivered with perfect comic timing. A must.” —School Library Journal, starred review

Eliza Kinkz is a Tejana artist who never stopped viewing the world through the bright colors of her crayons, AND she even ate a few, too! She's illustrated many hilarious picture books, including Papá's Magical Water-Jug Clock by Jesús Trejo which won the Pura Belpré Illustration Honor, and was the 2022 James Marshall Fellow. All her ridiculous scribbles burst straight from her heart, which is overflowing with joy. . .and probably a few crayon pieces. Eliza lives in Austin, Texas, with her family and her one true love, a huge bowl of queso. Mistaco is her author-illustrator debut, and you can spill all the frijoles to her at ElizaKinkz.com.

Am I Blue?

Quest For The Marine Blue: 2026 

Michael Sedano

It would have been 2020 when I spot the first specimen of a butterfly, new to me, that continues to hold my attention when I walk through gardens, now in search of the perfect foto of this gorgeous gem.

I looked up the one I photographed at a distance. I marveled at its name, “marine blue” Leptotes marina. It wasn't blue. It was mottled brown. Why is that speckled brown butterfly called Marine blue? 

Over succeeding months I wander perplexed as can be that this brown-speckled creature I see only at a distance, has “blue” in its name. 

Finally I see it, the blue! My photographer’s quest gains a high point in search of the blue. Once sighted once determined to see another. Today, like a blue moon you’ll see me standing alone, near a plumbago cluster or some anonymous shrubbery. 

I'll be watching a cloud of whitish grey insects that flitter incessantly, rarely landing. I hold the camera against my chest, poised to raise the viewfinder to the left eye as my right eye vigilantly surveys the flitting white souls, I seek the one or two who land near enough for a foto. 

And long enough. Touch-and-go is the Marine blue’s habit. When mating seems a good idea, the resting butterfly spreads its wings, opening the brown-speckled exterior to a glittery purple-blue inner wing with a blue fuzzy covering across its thorax. I'm not fast enough to capture instants when a second blue thrashes into the open-winged beauty and the pareja flits away.

Shadow and interior branches take away most of the glowing blue and purple. Out in open shade makes glorious, detailed portraits. Full sun gives intense contrast and, at the right angle, great color. I prefer a 100mm macro lens; it creates images of precision and detail.

Recent years have been tough for Leptotes marina sightings. Reliable sites became unreliable and sightings remained catch as catch can and way over there pa’lla you see the flittings of what might be Marine blue, or the more common Grey hairstreak. By the time I walk to the spot, they’ve flitted away. 

Only as October 2026 wraps for the year does my Huntington Library walkabout help me produce a current year once again blue foto. 

The image happens in full sunlight over my shoulder. It’s the only butterfly to land near enough for the macro lens’ focusing capacity. 

I step off the paved path onto the Huntington’s don’t-tread-on-me tierra, angle myself to within six inches of the creature, dance the lens in and out until I find the focus across the entire butterfly. I push the button. And again and again until the vista in the viewfinder is just leaves. The sighting for 2026 produces only a dozen fotos. I like one good enough to share, so as usual, I am satisfied to have what I have.

December 2022 marks the end of the fourth year Barbara and I lived with Alzheimer’s dementia. As sole caregiver—I would not have it any other way—I needed regular respites. 

A four-times a week respite most often finds me camera in hand at one of southern California’s large gardens, the Huntington Library and the LA County Arboretum. 

I walk and see what I can see and forget what I can forget and resolve the unresolvable. When I see a butterfly or bird my enormous complicated world becomes the limits of my viewfinder. For these fractions of seconds This is all there is. I am here. Press the button.

Here is my La Bloga column from a December 2022 walkabout when I exulted having found the answer to the question, why is that speckled brown butterfly called Marine blue? 

Mira nomás! 

2026. Here is the camera's full-frame view of the inch-long Marine blue. It doesn't land on a flowering bush, the Dalea bicolor where I'm standing. When it opens its wings I'm breathless. My quest is a foto showing how it gets its name and here it is. All I have to do is twist my body and lean forward and not fall on my face.

2026. The butterfly is oblivious to the happy photographer who's crept on his knees to a closer vantage spot and gets to move in for a close-up with the close-up lens. The tattered wing and fading color identify this as an old-timer making a few final forays in search of a mate and a place in the sun.

====

 

From La Bloga Archives:

Mystery Mariposa Comes Into Focus

Michael Sedano

Original location: https://labloga.blogspot.com/2022/12/marine-blue-plan-comes-together.html 

Realms of green make up my oft-traveled routes when I consider how the morning light finds a bird or butterfly where I point my camera during my morning respite walkabouts at Huntington Library. 

Gulf Fritillary on Jessamine cluster

As a full-time caregiver, I know the vital importance of having time to myself. I buy two mornings with a visiting caregiver, and twice a week, Barbara attends a dementia daycare center, giving me six hours respite time all to myself to do with as I please. I pay a premium to walk the gardens of the Huntington Library two hours early, so that's what I please. 

Fritillary rests on Savila penca

A photographer gets the early light and not a lot of foot traffic to scare off the critters that draw my lens. The membership is worth the money and, membership has its privileges. You get the whole place to yourself, casí.

One morning I stalked the Aechmea flowers along the rainforest trail. My eye catches a white fleck against deep green. The tiny moth, or butterfly, flits erratically about, touches down but doesn’t land. 

I wait it out. The white speck flits in and out of the shadows, touching and flitting, disappearing into the leaves only to reappear a few plants away.

Then it lands. I approach and the white speck flutters away. I get a fuzzy foto that I identify as a Marine Blue butterfly. I'm intrigued. The name belies the look of this brown mottle winged soul. 

I add the Marine Blue to my inner alert list. I begin filtering the view sensitive to those flitting white specks on a horizon. Not the White Cabbage butterfly, nor an assortment of white moths and hover flies and tiny bees. Rarely catching a glimpse of the elusive Blue, I stay alert with high hopes.

Butterfly and bird photography takes what nature provides. When I see one, I see one, rarely three, in the distance. I see those white flecks and have no clue to the blue. 

"Ah ha!" moment: Marine Blue shows its color

Spring is in full flush in late March when I see my first blue Marine Blue butterfly on an unfamiliar plant. I get a foto at long distance. 

I see a few folded wings on this plant subsequently, but despite long waits there, not a one Blue parks and opens its wings to show off its hidden spectrum. The butterflies park and flit, I stand and fret.

Unsatisfaction is not dissatisfaction. You can do something about nagging unsatisfaction. Something has nagged at me since that inroductory sighting at the Aechmea, something about this tiny erratic mysteriously-named life. I need to get a close look, and I need to get a macro showing all the details and reason for giving this beast its name, Marine Blue butterfly.

My walkabouts at the Huntington Library and at the Los Angeles County Arboretum a few miles away  grow more intent on finding the Marine Blue . 

I capture many a Fritillary, a Monarch and a Swallowtail. Dozens of Colibrí bring my heart joyful moments of pure respite as I hold the floating creature in the viewfinder, slow my breathing, anchor the lens to my body, synchronize eye brain finger decisive moment and press the button. 

But none of the fotos feature the Marine Blue butterfly. 

I grow more deliberate in my walkabouts, choosing trails where antes I’d spotted the Blue, stopping on a trail on a sunny morning watching for flitting white specks, even shaking a plant now and again to see what flies out. No Blues. 

The Mother Lode. The Elephant Graveyard. The Diamond Mine of the 7 Dwarves! Uncle Scrooge’s Money Vault. Eureka. 

I find the place where Marine Blues come to feed on crisp Fall mornings when the garden offers little else. 

With changing seasons, Butterflies have become scarce, and with Winter around the corner I’d abandoned thoughts of capturing the elusive Blue in 2022. 

Weeks had passed without a sighting when songs of feeding Colibrís stop me in my tracks. The birds hide behind thick branches so I planned to walk on to the Sausage Tree flower where hummingbirds might await.

I whirl toward the path when a white fleck catches my eye. 

Only a Blue flies like that. Then a second and third appear like magic and so it is. They fly into a ray of mid-morning sunlight and catch the light. They target a non-descript bush growing like a barrier between the path and a spectacular red Esperanza tree where the hummingbirds lurk. 

Not a barrier plant at all! It is the Marine Blue motherlode, Dalea bicolor. I stand stunned at the sight of this endless parade of flitting white specks that circle about the plant then land. The insect dances upon a flower cluster, dips its proboscis into the well of nectar. Then they spread their wings to catch the light and lighten my heart.

I won’t label my quest after a Marine Blue an “obsession” although I admit to growing frustration last Summer when I couldn’t find the Blue in the garden, and that grew into a klnd of anxiety that when I did see a Marine Blue, I had the wrong lens or I couldn’t get near enough with the right lens. And I'd nearly abandoned hope for this year of seeing them again. 

That’ s all in the past now because I know where Dalea bicolor grows at the Huntington. And I've seen the Marine Blue at just the right light when their wings shimmer with diamond dust painting the hidden reaches of their namesake wings. Ay de mi.

The Marine Blue led me to the Dalea’s tiny flowers to teach me to appreciate "nondescript" dust-catching bushes growing in the shadow of spectacular ornamentals. 

Órale, that was no obsession but a well-defined goal pursued with a deliberate process of looking. Looking just at the world as I find it. Looking and not thinking about all those caregiver duties and responsibilities that you can’t see when you’re making a photograph of one particular six by four inch slice of the real world there at the end of your lens and that’s all there is for right now.

Sabes que? This close up is why.

Día de Muertos: Poetry & Literary Reading 2026 by Xánath Caraza

Día de Muertos: Poetry & Literary Reading 2026 by Xánath Caraza

 

Xanath Caraza

Join us for our literary celebration of Día de Muertos: Day of the Dead. Listen to our featured readers, authors Xánath Caraza and Elvira Barbosa, share their literary creations. It will be a pleasure to have you join us. Please register in advance.

Xanath Caraza

Elvira Barbosa

 

Elvira Barbosa

Elvira Barbosa is a professor at the Federal University of Technology – Paraná (UTFPR), Apucarana Campus, Brazil, and a researcher specializing in linguistics and literary studies. As a novelist, she is also deeply interested in Brazil’s cultural memory and the ways in which history continues to shape contemporary society.

 

Drawing on her family roots in the Brazilian states of Minas Gerais and Bahia, Barbosa brings both emotional sensitivity and historical precision to her fiction. Her work explores the complex dynamics of power, memory, and identity with particular attention to the social structures that have shaped—and continue to shape—Brazil.

 

Nadja’s Secrets, her debut novel, weaves together literary fiction, social critique, and psychological depth. Through the voices of women and other figures marginalized by official history, the novel illuminates the contradictions, silences, and enduring emotional legacies that pass from one generation to the next.

 

She lives in Paraná, Brazil, where she teaches, conducts research, and continues to write literary fiction.

 

Xanath Caraza

Xánath Caraza

 

Xanath Caraza

Xánath Caraza is a traveler, educator, poet, short story writer, and translator.  She writes for La Bloga and Revista Literaria Monolito. In 2023 Red Teardrop received Gold Medal for Best Fiction Book Translation—Spanish to English for the International Latino Book Awards. In 2024 Tejerás el destino / You Will Weave Destiny received Honorable Mention for Best Bilingual Poetry Book—one author for the Juan Felipe Herrera Award, Internation Latino Book Wards. In 2023 La mariposa de Jackeline / Jackeline’s Butterfly received Bronze Medal for the Juan Felipe Herrera Best Poetry Award—One Author Bilingual for the International Latino Book Awards. In 2022 Perchada estás / Perching won honorable mention for the Juan Felipe Herrera Best Poetry Book Award-One Author-Bilingual. In 2021 It Pierces the Skin received Bronze Medal for the Juan Felipe Herrera Best Book of Poetry. In 2020 Balamkú received second place for the Juan Felipe Herrera Best Book of Poetry Award. In 2019 for the International Latino Book Awards she received Second Place for Hudson for “Best Book of Poetry in Spanish” and Second Place for Metztli for Best Short Story Collection. In 2018 for the International Latino Book Awards she received First Place for Lágrima roja for “Best Book of Poetry in Spanish by One Author” and First Place for Sin preámbulos / Without Preamble for “Best Book of Bilingual Poetry”.  Her book of poetry Syllables of Wind / Sílabas de viento received the 2015 International Book Award for Poetry. She was Writer-in-Residence at Westchester Community College, NY, 2016-2019.  In 2023 Caraza received a grant from the University of Missouri-Kansas City for writing her manuscript Sangre de vainilla / Vanilla’s Blood.  Her book of poetry, Corazón de agua /Heart of Water, was published in the Spring of 2024. Caraza was the recipient of the 2014 Beca Nebrija para Creadores, Universidad de Alcalá de Henares in Spain.  She was named number one of the 2013 Top Ten Latino Authors by LatinoStories.com. Her books of verse Where the Light is Violet, Black Ink, Ocelocíhuatl, Conjuro and her book of short fiction What the Tide Brings have won national and international recognition.  Her other books of poetry are Tejerás el destino / You Will Weave Destiny, Lips of Stone, Fără preambul, Μαύρη μελάνη, Le sillabe del vento, Noche de colibríes, and Corazón pintado. Caraza has been translated into English, Italian, Romanian, and Greek; and partially translated into Nahuatl, Portuguese, Hindi, and Turkish. 

 

Xanath Caraza

Poetry Connection: Connecting with Poets at Hollister Ranch

  

Melinda Palacio, Santa Barbara Poet Laureate 2023-2025

Last week Santa Barbara’s Poets Laureate received an invitation from Rick and Kathy Sawyer to spend an afternoon reading poetry and enjoying the beauty at Hollister Ranch. I was eager to attend this year because I know how special the coastline is above Santa Barbara. Hollister Ranch is a working ranch miles beyond Gaviota. I’ve passed through the signs and seen the ocean from the vantage of the 101 numerous times over the past two decades on my way back from Solvang, Santa Maria or beyond. I’ve been hiking in Arroyo Hondo and enjoyed concerts at El Capitan. The area with its twists and turns and deep drops to the ocean makes you feel worlds away from Santa Barbara, even though it’s just a half hour further north along the 101 coast.

The unusual warm temperatures we’ve been having due to El Niño (and global warming) meant that an afternoon in October felt like a summer day in Mexico or Hawaii. After lunch and reading poems at Hollister house, I thought I would simply dip my feet in the ocean and then drive home. However, the bubblebath temperature of the water coaxed me deeper into the ocean until I was floating far from the shore with other poets. I want to make a point of swimming in the Pacific Ocean more often. The water was refreshing and soul soothing.

This year’s poets retreat at Hollister Ranch was attended by Rick Sawyer, Kathy Sawyer, Jasmin Sawyer, Jessica Teona Schley, Steve Beisner, Melinda Palacio, George Yatchisin, Chryss Yost, Paul Willis, Sharon Willis, and David Starkey. It’s been a great week for hearing poetry and enjoying the company of local poets and friends. Except for the Sawyers and Jessica Teona Schley, everyone in attendance was also at George’s recent event, Spirits in the Air, Potent Potable Poetry, Halloween Season Edition 2026 at the Good Lion. Spirits in the Air featured ten readers who read a poem of their own and as well as someone else’s. Today’s poetry connection will feature two poems: one by Steve Beisner that Stephanie Barbé Hammer read and one by Elizabeth Perez. Both Stephanie and Elizabeth were first time attendees and readers at the poetry event dedicated to drinks or potent spirits.

Second Line

by Steve Beisner

In memory of Everette Maddox

We leaned against the bar, 

taking sanctuary in the cool dark,

four of us staring and talking truth and lies 

to each others’ faces,

through the sweet alcoholic haze 

and the dusty mirror behind the bottles.

Liza Jane ran through the door 

in red short pants and her top spillin’ out,

“There’s a second line comin’.”

We poured our drinks into plastic go-cups 

from Krewe of Chaos, 2006, 

and flowed out to stand on the sidewalk 

where the street shivered with bodies and music.

Somebody shouted, “Oh, yeah!” 

and we broke free, 

chased happy feet down the street

after brass horns, waving white handkerchiefs, 

red bandanas, and bar napkins over our heads.

Liza Jane was gettin’ hot.

“Why y’all celebratin’?” yelled the man 

with a cheap camera and a Texas accent.

Liza Jane dropped her arms and danced the 

shimmy with her bottom and shake it with her top,

so close to Texas that his face got hot, 

till his wife pulled his arm to go.

Liza jus’ laughed, “Take a caution, 

let your hair down, an’ answer this, Darlin’,

Why y’all not celebratin’?”

Steve Beisner is a computer programmer, a musician, and a writer of fiction and poetry.

He claims that he did not invent the computer, but was there when it happened.

His taste in fiction and poetry reflects the strange beauty of real life.

*an earlier version of this column was published in the Santa Barbara Independent

Elizabeth Pérez is a Cuban American writer and associate professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She was named a finalist for several literary prizes in 2024 and 2025, including Gunpowder Press’s Alta California Chapbook Prize. Her poem “Independence Night” won the 2025 River Heron Editors’ Prize. Pérez is also the author of two award-winning books on Caribbean and other Afro-Diasporic religions: Religion in the Kitchen: Cooking, Talking, & the Making of Black Atlantic Traditions (2016) and The Gut: A Black Atlantic Alimentary Tract (2023).