Sandra M. Castillo Biography

Born in Havana, Cuba, poet Sandra Castillo moved to Miami, Florida, with her family in 1970. Castillo earned both her BA and MA in creative writing from Florida State University. She is the author of My Father Sings to My Embarrassment (2002), selected by Cornelius Eady for the White Pine Press Poetry Prize. Her poems have been published in Cimarron Review, Midway Journal, Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, PALABRA: A Magazine of Chicano & Latino Literary Art, and the anthology Cool Salsa: Bilingual Poems on Growing Up Latino in the United States (1994).

Castillo’s early life in Cuba was shaped by her extended family—including a large cast of uncles and aunts—as well as the stories and ever-present possibility of immigration to the United States. Her poetry often draws on these childhood experiences, referencing an uncle’s photographs, relatives’ arrests, and the streets and lives left behind.

Castillo teaches at Miami Dade College in Florida.