Arnaldo Batista recently defended his master’s thesis for the Florida International University MFA program, with his thesis topic being focused on “queer identity and love.”

“Yeah, it was gonna be something else because I write a lot about being Brazilian and how I had to grow up with a machismo kind of ideology,” Batista said. “But that's still somehow made it through the book, and it's just how it informs my idea of what love means.”

Batista started writing when he was a teenager. He was very inspired by Sylvia Plath and attended Miami Arts Charter, where one of his teachers, Florida-based food critic and poet Jen Karetnick, encouraged him to continue working on his writing. His sister, who he calls his “soulmate,” was also a poet who encouraged him to join the FIU MFA program that they were able to go through together.

Batista explores themes of water throughout his work, which he attributes to growing up in Miami and coming from a Brazilian family as a first generation American.

He also explores what queer life is or what it could be.

“I talk a lot about drag queens and gay bars and leather bars,” Batista said. “Just trying to bring it to the more mainstream kind of lens, because I feel like a lot of queer life is secret or secretive. One of my goals is to show people how beautiful it could be, you know?”

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