Camille Hernandez Transforms MOTHERLANDS Poetry in One-Woman Show

The Sierra Madre Playhouse authors series spotlights poet/performer Camille Hernandez, the Poet Laureate of Anaheim, a compelling one-woman play in which she transforms poetry from her celebrated chapbook Motherlands with movement, rhythm, and language into dynamic living performance, on Saturday, November 15, 2026, 4:00 PM.

Motherlands explores themes of diaspora, belonging, and inheritance—what it means to carry many homes within one body. Through her work, Hernandez navigates identity across generations, languages, and geographies, using poetry as both confession and conversation. The performance builds on the traditions of spoken word and performance art while embracing the physicality of dance and theatre.

Hernandez, who grew up in La Palma as a self-described “public library girl” and voracious reader, crafts poetry into vibrant portraits of marginalized women. Her poetry interrupts the cycle of oppression by recreating narratives that dignify Black women, Filipino women, poor women, immigrant women, disabled women, medically marginalized women, gender-expansive women, and mothering women. Her work amplifies their survival, intuition, interconnection, and defiant joy, carving new narrative trails that explore the hushed intimacies lost in suppressed histories.