Meet Gia Civerolo

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Gia Civerolo. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Gia, really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?

Here is a poem about finding my purpose:

We both relax once we glide into the water
His body takes shape outside of a wheelchair
I feel the stiffness flow out like an exhaled breath
We both know the moment he becomes
light as a feather, floating on his back
His smile is brighter than the New Mexico sun shining
In that moment I know it is all about energy and connection
Years later, swimming laps at the YMCA, remembering
a New Mexico’s sun shimmering on a blue pool, I know
now that was the moment giving way to
my purposes, passions, professions and profoundness
I became the core of who I am
A poet, a teacher, a student, a mother, a special needs advocate
A human connecting with individuals and communities.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I feel like all the threads throughout my life that felt separate, in color, textures, communities, and communications, have all come together forming a perfect tapestry. The strongest expression creatively has been poetry, photography, and combining the two. My writing consists of imagery and storytelling provoking great empathy for characters and places. I feel my photography does that by freezing moments. I have expanded to doing Broadside Art and Collages.

On the swim team at nine-years-old, I taught swim lessons to kids with disabilities. Since then I have taught in and out of classrooms, libraries, workshops, sports, poetry, etc. My son, who is now a teacher’s aid and a sports broadcaster, had autism pretty severely when he was young. I became a special needs advocate passing forward knowledge and resources given to me. I have a producer’s mind, always seeing the big picture as well as the small details to make events, movies, shows, and more, entertaining and as professional as possible.

I currently perform poetry around the city of Los Angeles. My self-published book of poetry, “She Confuses Lovers, Movies, Angels and Poems” won a 2025 International Impact Award and was runner up in the 2025 New York City Book Festival. I am honored to be published in several anthologies as well as featured in the Bards of Southern California: Top 30 SoCal Poets. My photographs have been exhibited in museums, city halls, art galleries, billboards, magazines and across the United States as well as internationally. I am always most proud to be Riley’s and Holden’s Mother.

I am working on my website to be able to sell books, prints, T-shirts, earrings etc.
I am releasing a new zine this Fall “Eve’s Daughter” in collabaration with Jack Begakis.
I am receiving the New York Book Festival 2025 Runner-Up Award in October 2025.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

Looking back, I feel the three qualities, skills and/or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in my journey are:

Empathy
Being Observant
Thirst

Empathy is what makes me a good poet, teacher, mother, artist, friend, etc. I feel deeply and I am very sensitive to people, places, animals, energy. To me, empathy is surrounded with light and love. Caring about people’s stories, lives, peace, struggles, and joy. I feel this feeds into my soul as an artist, showing active empathy role models better than giving any advice. I also feel with some people you cannot teach them how to step outside their selfishness to care for others.

Being observant fuels my understanding of others. It helps my artistic esthetic, and relates to me being empathetic. I observe people noticing their energy, behavior, appearance, and all aspects of their being. It serves me very well as a substitute teacher to assess the situation very quickly! Advice to others would be to sit quietly and observe your own feelings and energy. Begin field trips where you really look, listen and feel other people’s subtexts.

Thirst for: knowledge, art, passion, justice, life, feeling, curiosity, travel, experiences, adventures, words, community, cultures, love, love, love.

Awesome, really appreciate you opening up with us today and before we close maybe you can share a book recommendation with us. Has there been a book that’s been impactful in your growth and development?

Not to be completely egotistical yet I have to pick my own poetry book, “She Confuses Lovers, Movies, Angels and Poems” just because of the dreams it fulfilled and what I learned creating it. The late great poet, Nikki Giovainni, self published her first two books and always spoke about how glad she was that she did it that way because of how much she learned. I started creatively writing again during the pandemic. I began to workshop not only poems on the written page but performing them too which I had never planned on doing. I was approaching writing the book more from an academic sense. Performing opens up a whole other world for me. The community of support, love, and encouragement from great poets, artists, musicians, and teachers has been phenomenal for my soul both artistically and as a human. I helped produce a film festival for many years and one of the projects I worked on was producing a book for the sponsors. Even with that experience, I still learned so many details like how important fonts are and how to stand up for your vision.

My book is a dream come true. It also seemed to help put away self doubts of whether I was an actual writer and artist. Trusting my instincts while really listening to my book was one of the many collaborations I bonded with deeply. Also, advocating and creating the right team for collaboration was essential to keeping my authenticity, aesthetic and sanity.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://giaciverolo.weebly.com/#/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/giaciverolo/

Image Credits

1. Personal Photo: Gia, B & W , Photo By Robert Douglas
2. Gia B & W pix & Bio: Photo By: David Hideo Maruyama & Digital Art By: Jessica Saravia
3. Gia B & White “Super Power” Photo By: David Hideo Maruyama
4. “Decimated Sky” Poem & Photo By: Gia Civerolo. Digital Art By: Robert Douglas & Riley Civerolo Douglas
5. “Dark Ocean & Light”. Photo By: Gia Civerolo
6. Gia color with angel wings Photo By: Riley Civerolo Douglas
7. “She Confuses Lovers, Movies, Angels and Poems”. Book Cover Photo By: Gia Civerolo.
Book Cover Design By: Riley Civerolo Douglas and Emily Anne Evans
Photo of Book and Awards By: Emily Anne Evans
8. “Applause Puppet”. Photo By: Gia Civerolo
9.. Color photo Gia Reading: Photo By: essica Saravia