Contributors

For over a century, El Palacio has been a forum for voices exploring New Mexico’s art, archaeology, history, and landscape. Explore the writers, photographers, historians, and scientists whose perspectives have defined the magazine’s pages—past and present.

A man with short gray hair and glasses, wearing a collared shirt, looks at the camera against a black background.

Arthur Sze

Arthur Sze is the current U.S. Poet Laureate. Sze is a poet, translator, and editor. He is the author of twelve books, including Into the Hush, Sight Lines, and others. Sze’s poems have been translated into fifteen languages, and he is the recipient of the National Book Award among many other honors. He lives in Santa Fe.

A woman with long dark hair wearing a coral shirt sits outdoors, resting her chin on her hand, with greenery and flowers in the background.

Deborah Jackson Taffa

Deborah Jackson Taffa is a citizen of the Quechan Nation and Laguna Pueblo. Her memoir Whiskey Tender was a 2024 National Book Award Finalist and was longlisted for the 2025 Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction. Taffa serves as the director of the MFA in creative writing program at the Institute of American Indian Arts.

A woman with straight brown hair wearing a dark turtleneck and long, beaded earrings poses against a plain white background.

Cara Romero

Cara Romero is an award-winning contemporary fine art photographer. An enrolled citizen of the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe, Romero’s expansive oeuvre has been informed by formal training in film, digital, fine art, and commercial photography. She maintains a studio in Santa Fe, regularly participates in Native American art fairs, and was featured in PBS’ Craft in America (2019).

Person with curly dark hair and glasses wearing a black shirt, smiling and looking up at the camera indoors near a door and light switch.

Tommy Archuleta

Tommy Archuleta (opens in a new tab) works as a therapist at The Life Link, a local non-profit agency that since 1987 has served the unhoused and migrant communities of Santa Fe, New Mexico, his hometown. His poems have appeared in numerous print and online literary journals. Susto, his full-length debut collection, published April 2023 by the Center for Literary Publishing, is featured in the November/December 2023 issue of Poets & Writers as part of the magazine’s annual, 5 Over 50, column. He is the seventh poet to serve as laureate for the City of Santa Fe and is a 2025 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow.  

Bright red cactus flowers bloom among spiky, pale green stems, with several buds visible on a sandy ground background. [gen-ai]

Selected Poems

By Eve West Bessier & Tommy Archuleta Eve West BessierGila Triptych 1. The Crimson Hedgehog Cactus (Echinocereus Triglochidiatus) Your overt juxtaposition of skin lacerating aggression and soul captivating lushness is an approach-avoidance dance. I cannot resist your improbable gesture of seduction. Your Byzantine palette of purple stamen contained as deep surprise within vermilion blossoms is piously papal, while your chartreuse stigma screams inebriated Mardi Gras!