Finding the Flow

My one-word theme for 2025 was Rhythm. I chose this word because as I transitioned my life through several big changes, I wanted to find a new rhythm for how I would spend my days as a full-time writer and teaching artist, and how Ramiro and I would create this new life together. Looking back on this year now, this word still resonates.

On Christmas Eve we were staying near Niagara Falls state park in upstate New York. It had been very cold and snowy the few days prior, but on that day we had a reprieve from the wind and the sun shone brightly, inviting us to take Tajin to see the falls. It was magnificent, one of those moments when you witness the natural splendor of a place so big and profound it is difficult for the mind to look at it and reconcile standing in that place as though it were just a normal day.

Also, look at this adorably photogenic little guy taking in the majesty of the falls!

We went back again after Christmas to the Cave of Winds (see Ramiro’s photo above) where we were able to take in the splendor of the falls from below. I could imagine from all the photos in the lobby and gift shop how beautiful the falls are in the summer time during peak tourist season, but there was something hauntingly magical about the falls in the winter, the water’s roar quieter, creating a winter mist that clung to my glasses. The ice that covered the tree branches and rocks below the falls glistened like they’d been glazed with sugar, and the river below drifted along, unhurried.

That’s when my word for 2026 came to me: flow. I’d been puzzling around with other words like whimsy, deliberation, and others that seemed at odds with each other, but flow encompasses so many of the feelings I want to feel and harness in this year to come. Bodies of water can trickle, stream, curve, flow straight and calm, and they can rage, inexorable, purposeful, deliberate. I wanted that kind of flexibility in the meaning of my word for 2026 as I plan book promotion events and freelance work for the spring and as we plan the second leg of our cross country travels.

It was interesting to be reminded too of how Nikola Tesla’s AC current harnessed the powerful flow of the falls to create the first hydroelectric plant of its kind and in 1896, brought electrical power all the way to Buffalo, NY, creating the same electric power structures we use today. Still, the damn that was previously used to harness this power was eventually removed so that long term damage to the natural splendor of the falls was unimpeded. There’s that flow again!

On New Years Eve we braved the cold for a walk through Deveaux Woods State Park‘s old growth forest with a state park educational guide and a local volunteer. We were lucky to have an hour of reprieve from the six inches of snowfall we got later in the day. Though it was cloudy, as we traversed the forest, stopping for the guide to point out local tree species, plants in hibernation and wildlife, as well as the history of the area, a quiet descended around us. Since our group was only five people, we got to talk with our guide quite a bit about our travels and what we had learned about the wildlife and vegetation across the Northeast. She commented that many people who visited complained about the wintertime when visiting the park, but we seemed to be enjoying it. I reiterated how I had come to appreciate the winter and its quiet as a time of rest, reflection, and incubation, much like the many life forms in the woods, like the insects under the leaves, the trees drawing in their resources with very little water coming in, the squirrels foraging for nuts while the other animals slept.

On January 1st, I was already having trouble with my word navigating new health insurance and trying to get my needed migraine medications from CVS without having to pay 2,500 dollars. I was stressed and frustrated by the entire interaction, despite the pharmacist trying her best to help me.

The next day, on the road to Ohio, making our way back home to Texas to stay for a couple of months, we read about our government’s invasion of Venezuela and kidnapping of Nicholas Maduro and his wife on narcoterrorism charges. On a news radio program, we heard a report from a journalist in Caracas who talked of some Venezuelans celebrating Maduro’s fall, while many others waited in line for hours at supermarkets, filled with anxiety about what the future held for them and their country. One older woman talked about her fear that she wouldn’t have access to the medications she needed to live.

While every major news site focuses on Trump’s bombastic claims of taking over Venezuelan oil reserves and his threats to do the same to a number of other countries, including Cuba and Greenland, I am reminded that there is very little talk of the everyday people these acts of imperialist violence affect. It’s people in Nigeria after a US bombing who were awoken in the night to see fires raging near their homes. It’s Palestinians in Gaza struggling to keep warm and dry as their tents flood in refugee camps while one of the architects of their genocide and mass displacement attends Trump’s New Years Eve party. And it’s those living here in the US, in the imperial core, watching our country war monger and invade, depose and threaten other sovereign countries to pillage their resources under the guise of combating “terrorism” and promoting “freedom” while claiming that universal healthcare, living wages, affordable housing and access to clean water and air are unattainable, and anyone who would demand these basic human rights are communists and enemies of the state.

In 2025 alone, ICE agents were deployed to wage war on communities across the US, and 32 people have been killed in ICE custody. Just this week, reports about the murders of Keith Porter and Renee Nicole Good have shaken these communities, making it starkly clear that state violence does and will harm anyone who tries to resist it. Lit Hub has shared one of Good’s poems here. Historically, the work of fascist governments on behalf of capitalist exploitation escalate violence and control in the face of resistance. We mourn those who have been taken, and the ways that allowing the dehumanization of the most marginalized folks in our communities allows everyone to be dehumanized. But I am also reminded that though their might seems absolute, fascists have a very tenuous grip on power. They have the potential to wield untold violence and harm, and that should scare us, but they also know how much people are resisting are them, or they wouldn’t be investing billions in buying up media conglomerates and using AI to surveil communities and push their propaganda.

I started listening to the audiobook, How to Fall in Love with the Future: A Time Traveler’s Guide to Changing the World by climate organizer and author Rob Hopkins. In the beginning of the book, Hopkins writes a speculative imagining of time traveling to the year 2030 and imagines all of the many beautiful ways that communities across the globe have created the world the future they want to live in. The book asks us to think about not just what we want to have in the future, but what it will feel like, sound like, look like, etc. One of Hopkins’ projects is called Field Recordings from the Future which is an multimedia project and album he co-created with musician, Mr. Kit, to help activate listeners to engage with a future they can imagine. I started doing this exercise and hope to continue, as I think that only through this kind of imagining can we consider and put into action how to make these hopes possible. Another book in conversation with this one is adrienne marie brown’s Emergent Strategy. Reading it this morning, I was struck by her referring to Octavia Butler’s work, especially in Parable of the Sower, that accepting change as a necessary constant and that change must spur action. “I want a future where we are curious, interested, visionary, adaptive.” I found myself thinking the same thing. Brown talks about collective visioning, and how a sustainable future means we don’t all have to be the same person in a static sense of community. They remind us that there is nothing wrong with being nomadic, as many people have done since before there were borders.

I have felt so much freedom in our travels across the US so far, but I have also had feelings of doubt and guilt, being away from the loved ones and community members I cherish as we struggle against growing inequities and insecurities. How could we leave when things are getting so bad? What this brown’s words reminded me is that my question assumes many things: that my physical absence means abandonment, that I can’t be accountable to and care for my loved ones and community from afar, or even that I am disconnected from them in some way. While it is true that the ways that we care for one another change when we are not physically close, care doesn’t go anywhere. It changes and evolves. These travels have also allowed us to reconnect to loved ones we haven’t seen in many years and spend brief but beautiful time in their lives. I think I had also convinced myself that as wanderers, we are just respectful visitors to a place. While that is of course true, we are still accountable to the people we interact with, the places we visit, and the people we meet in RV parks and campgrounds who we share tips and resources with. We have witnessed the ways each place we visit care for another from the many resource and Little Free Libraries I’ve documented to the protests and acts of solidarity we have seen to the way communities are sharing resources, such as the land cooperatives and solar power sharing we most recently witnessed in Vermont. Even in the negative experiences, every place we have been has reminded us that more people care for each other than not. These travels haven’t just been about exploring and experiencing, or looking for our next home. They have been about learning to envision how I want to live with others in the future.

As I made my 26 goals for 2026 (lofty I know), I made sure to mix some of concrete and necessary goals like planning events to promote my books with fun and whimsical goals such as “learn to crack an egg with just one hand,” or “learn bird calls I am unfamiliar with” or “learn the names, both scientific and colloquial, for the trees we encounter.” Without whimsical imaginings, connected to what is meaningful to us, why imagine at all?

Maybe you are already putting into action the kind of community, the kind of world you want to experience in the future. What would it take to make these ideations, these dreams a reality? Maybe’s joining and learning more about the General Strike US. Maybe it’s checking in on your neighbors. Maybe it’s creating art meant to break through the propaganda hole we often find ourselves in. I don’t have a definitive answer because what actions I take are mutable and changing too. I think our actions will not be fixed, but will be ongoing, like ice melting to create a steady stream carving through the landscape, nourishing and reforming in its wake.

What is your work for 2026 going to be? Leave me a note in the comments, and take a minute to fill out the poll below!

To find more photos and videos of our travels, follow me on Instagram or Tiktok!

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What’s Happening with Leticia?

I am excited to share that my poetry chapbook, Offerings to the Tumbled Temple, is out now from Purple Ink Press! You can purchase a copy here. Chapbooks like these make great gifts for the holidays! And if you love your local library, you can request that they stock a copy.

My next horror collection, The Remedy is the Disease, will also be out next May, 2026 from Undertaker Books.

Here are some ways that you can help me to promote my book (and other indie poets and writers):

• Buy a copy if you can.
• Share the book with your loved ones.
• If you love your local library or independent bookstore, you can request that they stock a copy.
• Nominate my book(s) for your next book club read!
• If you or anyone you know reviews books, you can request an copy from me to review!
• I am now booking for 2026 events, so if you have a bookstore, community organization or space you would like for me to provide a workshop or reading/event for, comment or reach out via my contact page on my website to plan further!

I am also getting back into freelancing again, so if you have a publication or blog you are seeking writers for, I would love to work with you! Here are two pieces I wrote recently:

1. “10 Books About the Diversity of Disabled Experiences“ with Electric Lit.
2. “Creeping Fungus: works of Sporror” with Reactor Magazine.

2026 Workshops and Events

I am currently planning my readings, workshops and events for 2026 and will announce more details in soon. One is already on the calendar:

Climb Inside Other Minds: Exploring Persona Poetry with Leticia Urieta, March 28th from 10am-2pm CST with Gemini Ink (in-person). Register today or share with your poetry loving friends!

We will be traveling through New Mexico, Colorado and through the west coast May-December of this year, so if you have any community members or booksellers you suggest I connect with, please let me know!

Get Support for Your Creative Projects!

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I am currently taking on clients ages 16 and up for my services, although if your child would like support honing and publishing their work, I am happy to work with younger clients upon request. Since I write across a variety of genres, I am able to work with folks who are writing poetry, creative nonfiction, short stories, novels and more, with a special place in my heart for horror, speculative fiction and fantasy. If you are working on a comic, that is fantastic. I would love to work with you! Or, please share with other writers you know who might be interested!

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What I’m Reading and Watching: 2026 Bingo Card

I loved making my 2025 reading bingo card so much last year that I decided to do it again for 2026! It helps me feel both whimsical and deliberate in my reading, giving me structure and freedom to choose and diverse variety of books while also holding myself accountable to my physical TBR. I like to draw and color some symbols or illustrations I associate with these genres. They probably make more sense to me than to you! Some are repeats from last year because I liked them or keep coming back to these genres. Here are the categories for this year:

1. Nature Books
2. Fantasy Books
3. Haunted House Books
4. Folklife/folklore and fairy tales
5. Essential Nonfiction Reads (I have an ever-growing list)
6. Surprise finds from a library or bookstore or books I receive as a gift
7. Challenging novels (longer ones, complex, realistic)
8. Graphic novel or comic
9. Books about States/Regions we visit or by authors from that region
10. Finish books in progress (this is a big one!)
11. YA or Middle Grade books
12. Audio books for the Road (read with Ramiro)
13. 2025 Rollover Books (another list I am trying to get through this month)
14. Horror Books
15. Short fiction (short story collections and novellas)
16. Music Books
17. Works in Translation
18. Poetry Books
19. Physical TBR (either books I physically own or on my Kobo)
20. Review Books from Netgalley or other publications
21. Food Books
22. Speculative Fiction or Sci Fi Books
23. Bookclub or Partner Reads (I hope to do more of these this year!)
24. Books Published in 2026
25. Books by an Auto-read or To-read Author (I have an ongoing list of folks whose new work I always read or folks who I have been meaning to read and want to prioritize).

For January I am trying to work through books, especially novels in progress and nonfiction titles from the library on Libby or Hoopla before starting new work. While I love being a mood reader, I did find last year that my frenetic jumping around from one novel to the next hampered my ability to really focus on what I enjoyed about some of these novels. So I am going to try to remain focused on one novel at a time as much as possible and DNF liberally as needed. I will also continuing to make notes in my Reading Journal to keep me focused and help me record my takeaways, especially for those books I enjoy the most. I do want to report success that I finished one book on my Kobo TBR already this year: The Scald-Crow by Grace Daly (more on this book later!)

I do have some anticipated reads on Netgalley or on my library holds, including Psychopomp and Circumstance by Eden Royce, Itch! by Gemma Amor, I Love You, Don’t Die by Jade Song, The Subtle Art of Folding Space by John Chu, The Vanishing Cherry Blossom Bookshop by Takuya Asakura, The Macabre by Kosoko Jackson, Seasons of Glass and Iron by Amal El-Mohtar and many others. Excited to share more!

What books are on your 2026 TBR?

Journaling Prompts

Over the last year, I’ve started to get uncomfortable with asking my loved ones and community members “how are you?” It’s not that I don’t want to know or hold space for the complicated responses that this question might bring up, but I know that when I am asked this question, I often don’t know how to respond. Because like, some days I take joy in the pancakes I just made, a walk we took, a breakthrough I have had on one of my creative projects. Other days, just feeding myself and doing laundry feels like a herculean task in the face of so much hatred and willful disregard for life. I know so many in my life often feel the same. So instead, I have started asking, “what is feeding your heart or soul or creative self today?” This has created opportunities for those I care about to share their gardening projects, books they are reading, new video games or RPG campaigns they are excited about, and much more. Some of these folks are writers who have felt some levels of shame or disappointment about how they are not writing. These conversations can sometimes be reminders for them and myself that any form of creative action is beautiful and worthwhile.

For Christmas, I wanted to buy myself a sturdier case for my Kobo E-reader, but was having trouble finding one I liked. Ramiro suggested that I make one. At first I doubted myself, as I had not knitted or crocheted anything in a long while. But I rummaged through my supplies, found some yarn I had and the appropriate sized crochet need, looked up some general designs online and got started. I had to start over four times! But once I finally got started, my hands remembered the steps, and by Christmas I had finished my new e-reader case.

It is a little lopsided and certainly not the prettiest thing I ever made, but it is functional, protective and makes me happy to look at.

So here is my journaling prompt for you:

What creative practices do you find yourself intuitively reaching for? What practices or activities lately have been feeding your heart?

Call to Action: Opportunities for Solidarity and Care

There is so much need in the world, coming from within and without our most immediate communities. Maybe you are already working with mutual aid groups and doing the good work of caring for others. Here are some other ways you might support folks in need:

• Both Keith Porter and Renee Nicole Good’s families have created GoFundMe’s to help cover their funeral expenses and other needs they have.
• The Sameer Project, a grassroots organization of Palestinian volunteers who are working tirelessly to provide meals, baby formula, water and medical supplies to families in Gaza despite the increased Israeli bombardment despite the “ceasefire” and blockade of aid which is supposed to be delivered.
• The Sudan Solidarity Collective work tirelessly to support grassroots initiatives to aid Sudanese people who have been besieged and displaced.

What are other ways you are giving of your time and resources in solidarity with others?

Leticia