Publishers at the Haitian Caribbean Book Fair 2014. The third annual Haitian Caribbean Book Fair, a Knight Arts grantee, will be held this weekend, beginning with an opening reception on Saturday evening and running through Sunday, May 24th at the Little Haiti Cultural Center.  The Haitian Caribbean Book Fair is part of a boom in literary culture in South Florida. Not too long ago, the Miami Book Fair International was the only major literary festival in town.   Today, the literary landscape is booming, thanks in part to the Knight Foundation's support of local organizations, such as the O, Miami Poetry Festival, Tigertail Productions, the Reading Queer Literary Festival, and The Writer's Room at The Betsy Hotel, among others.

A few weeks ago, in full stealth-mode, I snuck into the Miami Light Project to borrow their bench and ice-cold air. A rock was propping the side door open. It was hideously hot, and the air conditioning at the Wynwood Warehouse, where I was working across the street, wasn't cutting it. I'm not shy, so I walked in. I hate to sweat. While I sat on the bench, I heard voices, music, footsteps wonderfully merge into a semi-melodic, circus-like symphony. And that's when it hit me. They were rehearsing for the 17th annual Here & Now festival, which commissions and presents local works. Here & Now 2015 will feature new work from Miami-based artists Liz Ferrer, Lazaro Godoy, Hattie Mae Williams and Michael Yawney. Hattie Mae Williams. I got up. Pulled out my laptop. Walked toward the music. I found Godoy, Mélanie Martel and Carlota Pradera gearing up and stretching to rehearse for Harmonicum Accordion / Act I, Godoy's homage to circus life via the story of a dysfunctional family. I sat on the cement floor as Godoy talked about the concept of the performance and the soundtrack played on loop in the background. "

The 2015 Out in the Tropics Festival, produced by FUNDarte, a Knight Arts grantee, runs from Tuesday, May 5th through Saturday, May 9th. The festival features work from innovative local, national and international GLBTQ artists, including Chely Lima, M. Lamar, Marga Gomez, Caridad Svich and John Moletress. M. Lamar. Photo by Michael Benabib. The festival opens on May 5th at 7 p.m. with an LGBTQ community panel and reception at the LGBT Visitor Center on Miami Beach. The panel, which is free and open to the public, is one my favorite events of the festival because it offers the community the opportunity to communicate and connect with the artists. On Wednesday, May 6th, poet Chely Lima will share work from his latest book, Urano Purpura, a collection of previously unpublished poems that narrates the complexity of the author's experiences living as a trans and bisexual man.