4 min read

A Profile of Melody Santiago Cummings and Caroline Cabrera –
 What it takes to make a poetry part of the public sphere

Published Apr 24, 2026
By
  • Daniel Rivero
Knight Foundation
O, Miami’s Caroline Cabrera (left) and Melody Santiago Cummings (right). Photo credit: Gesi Schilling

Overview

The bestselling piece of O, Miami poetry festival merchandise is a simple black T-shirt that reads, in white Helvetica font: Miami is a poem we write together.

 

“We literally can’t keep it in stock,” says Melody Santiago Cummings, the executive director of the festival.

Since Knight Foundation funded the first edition of O, Miami in 2011, thousands of Miamians have contributed poems to crowdsourced projects, helping to make the T-shirt’s declaration a reality. Over that same time period, poetry in the public sphere has become a common feature of Miami’s urban landscape.

Melody Santiago Cummings, executive director, and Caroline Cabrera, artistic director, share a few words about how O, Miami made the city a more poetic place.

Q&A

When you’re starting something like this, what’s the very first thing you have to do? Where does it all begin?

Caroline: Very rarely are we starting something entirely from scratch. The entire model of [O, Miami’s] success has been collaborative and trusting. Trusting in people, trusting in the audience, in the crowdsourcing.  And a lot of it turns on: Is it exciting? Is it something that surprises you or makes you ask more questions? It doesn’t have to be joy, but does it get your gears turning? Would you want to go to this or be a part of this? That’s what we’re constantly asking of ourselves.

What tools, skills or supports do you absolutely rely on to make this work possible?

Melody: Voice memos.  A lot of our projects start with Caroline and I sending voice memos to one another while we’re multitasking. Because we are either like literally driving between programs, or she’s driving from teaching one of her Sunroom classes, or we’re picking up our kids from school. So, we voice memo to each other reflections and the seedlings of projects,  trying to find things that excite us. And then we build on that.

What’s the toughest part of this work — the thing that demands the most from you mentally or logistically?

Caroline:  There is so much literal lifting in the job and so much physicality in publishing books and pulling off 30 days of programming in April. Like: “Hey, you know, the place that you thought was climate controlled — that your entire stock of books is in?” That place actually has a leak, and so now you’re moving everything.  It’s Melody and I and everyone else rolling up our sleeves, moving everything that’s needed for an event, then freshening up in the bathroom, putting on a dress and getting ready to be public-facing.

  • Knight Foundation
    Melody Santiago Cummings (left) and Caroline Cabrera (right). Photo credit: Gesi Schilling
  • Knight Foundation
    Zip Odes in Miami. Photo credit: Gesi Schilling

Who do you lean on? How did you build the team or partnerships that make this real?

Melody: We are successful because so many major institutions have wrapped their arms around us — Vizcaya, WLRN, Pérez Art Museum Miami, Miami-Dade Public Library. And Topos Graphics, because  historically poetry has not been known as being well designed. And we all know you judge a book by a cover, you eat with your eyes. So, we have created this really attractive, very Miami, polished, pretty, provocative, design identity and I think that is deeply attributed to the people we bring in to help us package this work that we are collecting and then rebroadcasting.

What’s one mistake or failure that taught you something essential?

Melody: Miami is wet and leaky. Real estate is a problem.  It’s a risky place to store books. It’s a risky place to store archival material. We lost a significant portion of our project archive due to instability of space — Hurricane Irma blew out the windows of our office, and we lost about 30% of our back catalog of books and prints.  Even if you own a place, it’s not secure from the climate and weather challenges here.

What helps you keep perspective or stay grounded when the work gets overwhelming?

Caroline: Focus on people. The kids have fun writing poems, and we have so much mutual respect and admiration for the artists we work with that we end our phone calls with “I love you.” The team is so mighty and so supportive of one another. When your work is community-based, you are always surrounded by support.

One book everyone should read

Melody: The Book of Delights by Ross Gay

Caroline: Madness, Rack, and Honey by Mary Ruefle

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