- cap

Claudia “cap” Alvarez-Plaud is a Latina writer, poet, educator, visual artist, and arts administrator from The Bronx, NY. Through her various art forms, she explores the challenges and joys of identity, grief, and spirituality.

Passionate about nurturing creativity and self-expression, cap leads poetry writing workshops across NYC and hosts annual community-driven, self-paced writing challenges. Author of Stories: Poems I Wrote While Turning Pain Into Hope, her poetry has been featured on stages including Dodge Poetry Festival, Carnegie Hall's Nuestros Sonidos, Bronx Music Hall, off-Broadway Triad Theater, the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, and in 2025 was the opening act for living legend MC Lyte at NJPAC.

When she's not musing, grindin, or painting her nails, she's probably on a flight "to and from nowhere land."

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Stories: Poems I Wrote While Turning Pain Into Hope

How many of your own stories have you forgotten? How many of those forgotten stories were "forgotten" on purpose? When was the last time you shared a story that once brought you pain?

Stories: Poems I Wrote While Turning Pain Into Hope (archived) is an ode to the taboo parts of healing that require you to share the stories you wish to forget. The part of healing that says "maybe someone needs to hear your forgotten story in order to heal their own."

In this poetry chapbook, cap uses imagery, personification, and “raw, unfiltered emotion” to take readers on a journey through growing pains, mourning the passing of her mother, and (like all poets), healing a heartbreak. Each chapter is prefaced, giving insight to the tone of the pieces, and adorned by all-original illustrations. A select few of the illustrations were available for purchase as stickers in 2021-2022.

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Note from the author: This chapbook was published while teaching 2nd Grade special ed in 2021, and stands as my first step in betting on myself as a writer. Though I am not the same woman or writer who put this collection together, I am incredibly proud of the poems and how far this project has taken me.