On Saturday, May 25, at 7 p.m., the second edition of the Poecítrics festival will take place at El Bartolí Botanical Garden. An afternoon of verses and citrus that will feature the participation of the poets Mario Obrero, María Sevilla and Josep Piera. These three renowned authors from different generations and backgrounds will offer a sample of their literary work in the middle of a privileged and unique landscape that celebrates the beauty of these fruits and the memory of the land. Our guest poets will take a citrus tour through their own verses as well as poets of all times. The Festival has been organized by the Todolí Citrus Fundació with the collaboration of the Dirección General del Libro of the Ministry of Culture, the Palmera City Council and the regional company Destilerías Ferri.

The Poecítrics festival wants to highlight “the union between the word linked to the landscape and a place dedicated to the conservation of citrus trees, an eternal and universal landscape legacy, through fruit that narrate the paths of history” in the words of the writer Àngels Gregori, artistic director of Poecítrics in her second consecutive year. Its celebration in an orchard-garden that concentrates approximately five hundred varieties of citrus from all over the world, makes it an unmissable spring event for lovers of culture and nature.

The image of this edition is the work of graphic designer Thomas Manss, who has taken as a starting point the installation Oro y redondo del mediodía (Gold and Round of Noon) by artist Carmen Calvo. For her part, María José Gálvez, general director of the Book from the Ministry of Culture, will be in charge of closing the event.

About the guest poets

Mario Obrero (Getafe, 2003). He started writing at the same time he learned, more or less, to walk. And since then he looks at the world in a way that readers, critics and authors have been attentively following (and celebrating) in his footsteps for years. Everything about him produces a vertigo that makes you smile, especially when you think of someone who flies so high and has his feet so firmly rooted on the ground. It is literally a tree loaded with cherries. He has recently published Tiempos Mágicos (Magic Times).

Josep Piera (Beniopa, 1947). He is one of the most important Valencian poets of our days. Continuator of the tradition of our classics, through his work (poetry, diaries, essays, narrative) he has been building, over half a century of writing, one of the strongest songs in the Mediterranean. In 2023 he was awarded the Honor Prize for Catalan Letters.

Maria Sevilla (Badalona, 1990). She is one of the most unique voices in current poetry and participates in festivals around the world saying her verses, which are (above all) a reflection on the construction – and representation – of identity. She knows that the cracks are the place through which light always passes and the wounds are the space where writing begins. Her latest work is La noche ovípara (The Oviparous Night).