Poetry Exchange by Elisa Garza and M. Miranda Maloney

Jun 9

June 9, 2022

About the Poets

Elisa A. Garza, a native Houstonian, has published two chapbooks, Entre la Claridad (Mouthfeel Press, soon to appear in a second edition) and Familia (The Portlandia Group). She has taught students from elementary through senior citizens in public schools, universities, and community programs. Currently, she works as a freelance editor.

M. Miranda Maloney is the author of The Lost Letters of Mileva (Yuguri editorial, Uruguay, 2019), and Cracked Spaces (Pandora Lobo Press, Chicago), forthcoming in August 2021. She is the founder of Mouthfeel Press. She lives in Huntsville, Texas, with her husband, Dan, dog Caspian, and two cats, Edison and Oni. She has three children in college, attending Texas universities.

On Finding Four Fish in My Grass by Elisa A. Garza

A pandemic is a sign

of apocalypse, a plague

that won’t end. But I worry

more today about the fish I found

this morning in the grass,

laid elegantly on their sides,

each eye glaring at the sky

like a burned-out beacon.

Only one is damaged, a few

missing scales tempting

green-black flies to feast

and leave eggs that will soon ripen

into greedy maggots that will eat

the flesh away. The other three fish

flex their tails in a soft curve

as if they are swimming,

moving smoothly through the grass,

seeking open water, as we

seek a life beyond illness,

beyond fear of infection,

seek freedom from plague,

from pestilence,

freedom from fearing,

from our own end,

an end we know is near,

an apocalypse nigh,

a plague of fish

just one of many signs.

Maria’s Response to Elisa’s Poem

The poem's title immediately opens a door of curiosity for the reader. It's an unusual title that begs the question: "How did they get there?" And, if I were a journalist, I'd continue with: How, when, why? Therefore, I want to read more. Curiosity piqued, I dive into the poem. Its first three lines: "A pandemic is a sign / of apocalypse, a plague / that won't end. But I worry" is a statement that turns inward at "But I worry," and here, suspended by enjambment, I'm able to ask, too, what can be more problematic than a pandemic. The answer comes quickly, as the poem moves briskly through the strategic interplay of enjambed lines that create a rhythmic flow, delightful to the tongue, beautifully structured lines. The sixth line, "laid elegantly on their sides," is a testament to the poem's form, including the space between lines that allow the poem to flow on the page, aesthetically pleasing to the eye, even as I encounter the next line "each eye glaring at the sky." The image is stunning. I love the word glaring. I think of other words: angry, glassy, defiant. The next line, "like a burned-out beacon" pulls me away slightly from the image. The comparison seems contradictory. But then, finding fish in the grass is unnatural, a contradiction.

The poetic voice describes the fish's position and condition in the second stanza. In the line "Only one is damaged, a few," the words one and few are positioned to continue to explore the contradiction. There's a play of words as if, at any moment, the syntax can be arranged to "Only one damage a few." I return to the beginning lines of the poem. It only takes one in a pandemic to spread to a few, and then more. Again, this stanza is full of assonance. The image pushes the poem forward to the third stanza in the last three lines. Here, the poem turns into a contemplative monologue. The poem's rhythmic and concrete identity the reader has grown accustomed is abandoned; instead, the reader is invited to reflect upon the experience of seeing four fish as a symbolic end. The final loop of the poem ties the significance of the fish found in the grass to our inward fears, to our external reality.

Lovely poem!

What was the process you used to tie in the various themes in the poem?

Maria

Elisa’s Reply to Maria’s Comments

I really appreciate you noticing the contradictions in the poem, and how they build upon each other. The main contradiction, that the fish are in a suburban yard of grass, not water, is where the poem began. After finding and photographing the fish while gardening, I contacted my biologist friends, who had a few theories: osprey (unlikely to drop one, much less four fish), or racoons who were startled at the beginning of their meal and ran. They settled on the latter, because of the bite marks on one of the fish. That afternoon, when I started writing the poem, I was thinking about the biblical plagues of fish, toads, and locusts, so fear of apocalypse and its signs, like the pandemic, became the focus of the poem. As you point out, the contradictions are central to the imagery and the themes of the poem: “a plague/ that won’t end” or is already over, dead fish “glaring,” “burned-out beacons,” “one” or “few.”

To answer your question, another key theme was things that are veering out of control: the pandemic, fish thousands of yards away from the nearest water, “greedy maggots that will eat/ the flesh away,” “fear of infection… plague… pestilence… our own end…apocalypse… many signs.” The image of the flies and maggots in the center stanza was an important way to tie together several uncontrollable things: the pandemic, the sudden appearance of the fish in the grass, and the many inward fears the speaker mentions about the ending of the world. The assonance you mention, as well as alliteration of Bs, Ps, and Fs in the first and last stanzas also help to tie the images and themes together.

I’m Rooting for the Coyotes by M. Miranda Maloney

We spent winter turning over mottled leaves, twigs

and branches, limbs of Itztlacoliuhqui, the Aztec god

of damp and dark, asleep or in decay. We unfolded chairs

on warm days beneath trees, our mutt ran creeks amok

with the chaff of plastic bits and bottle caps. I planned

to return to this place in summer. Humidity, rain, or sweat

weaving low to the bow of my back. But I don’t. Instead,

I visited the Gulf, its beach bedecked with waving shades

where children played. There was still a pandemic.

Except the ocean carried none of it but for sticky waves.

I may go to the desert. There, neighbors are losing pets

to coyotes jumping over rock walls to devour their flesh,

drink marrow like water. My heart breaks over their hunger,

and thirst. I can’t help it. I’m rooting for the coyotes. I keep

thinking if only the razing stopped, if only the scaling stopped

for one more strip mall, to squeeze in one more house. If only

I’d quit my want. But there are many like me. Searching

the horizon, my eyes seek the slender shapes of creatures stirring

farther where I cannot touch them, where I cannot hurt them,

where their string of sound is lost at last. All I say, I’m sorry.

Elisa’s Response to Maria’s Poem

I like the subtle details of this poem, how they build on the title, which lead me to wonder, is this a game or a competition? As I read, I realized that it is neither: the coyotes, and the planet as a whole, are already losing to our want. The “creeks amok/ with the chaff of plastic,” the ocean’s “sticky waves,” and the “razing” and “scaling” of the desert are the clues that this poem is about loss. As we lose the “string of sound” of the coyote, we also forget all the other things we have sacrificed to our greed for more: other animals, the landscape, water, natural beauty. All is “in decay,” although our “want” blinds us to this.

I know you were working on the line breaks as you revised this poem. I think the tercets were a great choice because I noticed that many of the lines and most of the stanzas are enjambed. I like how the long lines and sentences move us quickly through the poem and enable us to pause when the sentences are short, for emphasis, in lines 9, 11, 14, 17, and the final line. That final “I’m sorry” is so powerful. It apologizes not just to the coyotes, for the damaged landscape that leads to their thirst, but to the polluted waters, which we can no longer enjoy, and even to Itztlacoliuhqui, who would surely disapprove of what we have done. Some decay is necessary for renewal, he might say, but this has gone too far.

My question for you is: Can humanity come back from this environmental destruction and repair our drive for more things while we attempt to repair the planet? The poem suggests not, and I am wondering what you think.

Thanks so much for sharing this poem with me!

Elisa

Maria’s Response to Elisa’s Question

Thank you, Elisa, for your comments. To answer your questions: I still have hope in humanity. I believe that discourse about the environment should be changed to be more inclusive of the situations many working-class people face. As it is now, the media utilizes technical terms when discussing environmental degradation that distances humanity from being a part of nature – instead we are relegated to statuses of indifferent consumers who submit to the whims of technocratic bureaucrats. I hope my poem addressed this point. I do believe much of what is needed is for language to be inclusive when referring to the environment. We use language from a western perspective, as if the environment (and nature) is just another “issue” to address. Finally, I feel that the worst is on its way for our planet, but that we will learn from our impending trials and overcome them. I do have hope, certainly.

Thank you,