Apicha CEO, FilAm LGBTQ leader launches book of poetry

‘Parañaque to New York City Fifty Poems’ in NYC

By Marivir Montebon

New York – Distinguished journalist-mentor Sheila Coronel wrote the Foreword about the poetry memoir ‘Parañaque to New York City Fifty Poems’ by FilAm LGBTQ leader Therese R. Rodriguez. The book is published by Buensalido Public Relations and Communications in 2023.  

“These poems tell the story of a woman who has distinguished herself in a global city, in a country that has not always been kind to those who come to its shores. The book tells the story of a life well lived, a life worth celebrating, a life worthy of poetry,” wrote Coronel who is currently the director of Columbia University’s Toni Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism.

Coronel is the recipient of the 2003 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts. She was also an awardee of Columbia's highest honors, the Presidential Teaching Award, in 2011.

Therese Rodriguez, CEO of Apicha, author of 'Paranaque to New York City Fifty Poems'

The author, a staunch champion for inclusion

Rodriguez is the chief executive officer of the Apicha Community Health Center, a federally qualified health center that provides primary care and special care services to medically underserved and vulnerable communities. It has clinics in Manhattan and Jackson Heights in Queens. She is a staunch champion for the inclusion of Asians and Pacific Islanders (APIs) in US society.

Apicha, said Rodriguez, is a gift of the LGBTQ community to New York. It evolved from a grassroots volunteer organization to a community health center. At the height of the HIV epidemic, Asian American women civil rights and young gay men activists fought for inclusion in HIV surveillance. 

Rodriguez with Apicha staffers and COO Mihaela Mihai (2nd from left) at the Apicha clinic in Jackson Heights. 

These API and native American Indian activists went to Washington, D.C. and met with CDC and Health and Human Services officials to advocate for members of their communities who were living with HIV and dying of AIDS be removed from the category “Other.”

Born in Parañaque in Manila, Rodriguez came to New York in 1972. She had come a long way since then. Her daily dose of energy was hope. “We have to have hope,” she said in our conversation.

Her life is a daily celebration of that social consciousness and action.  Mihaela Mihai, operations director of Apicha, said Therese is the matriarch of Apicha.

Elinson: Hers is a poetry of witness, alongside Neruda, Hughes, Toha

San Francisco-based editor Elaine Elinson wrote her book review titled “A witness turns to poetry” published in Positively Filipino magazine: “The “poetry of witness” has a long and distinguished history in the world of literature. As American poet Carolyn Forche explains, these poems “inhabit the social sphere, a space between the personal and political.” Think of Chilean Pablo Neruda, Palestinians Naomi Shihab Nye and Mosab Abu Toha, and the chronicler of Black life during the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes.

Therese Rodriguez, author of a new poetry collection Paranaque to New York City, has added a sparkling new voice to this tradition. Her memoir in poetry offers a unique perspective on her life as a Filipina immigrant, lesbian, political activist, and public health pioneer.”

Elinson, former editor of the ACLU News, is now a San Francisco-based editor and creative writing instructor, a reviewer for the San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Review of Books, the New York Journal of Books, the Jewish Book Council, and a theater reviewer for 48 Hills.  

Former Philippine Ambassador Virgilio Reyes Jr. described Rodriguez as a pioneer Filipino immigrant, nationalist community organizer, human rights activist, and unabashed LGBTQ advocate. Her book, reviewed by Ralph Peña, a producing artistic director at Ma-Yi Theatre, is a “testament to Therese’s creative mind and her deep understanding of the Filipino American.”

On October 24, 2024, ‘Parañaque to New York City Fifty Poems’ book launch will be held at The Door, 555 Broome Street in downtown Manhattan in an evening of poetry reading. Proceeds of the book will go to Apicha to sustain its health programs for the community.

Join us on the book event on Thursday, October 24. Please register through this link. https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=100301015173560&set=a.660877766053455