Martín Espada

Espada as always shines in his egalitarian, democratic, engaged understanding of poetry's political and social responsibilities. This collection of reflective essays mixes poetry, criticism, history and anecdote to sketch a comprehensive worldview in which poets respond to the silencing of their own voices by speaking for others, where poets are advocates and historians writing the collective memory those in power would sooner elide. There are startling facts presented, and anti-war poems so show more wrenching that I found myself crying in a cafe to the confusion of those around me. The compelling argument that politics always has and continues to occupy a necessary place at the heart of poetry is made especially in the essay "A Rebuttal" in which the sanitized history of poetry in the 20th century is exploded as the result of self-censorship by the collective academic memory in response to the fear of the McCarthy era inquisitions. show less

Martín Espada's Floaters is a remarkable collection of prose poems, simultaneously dark and hopeful. Some of the floaters are bodies, friends he's lost. He unspools memory after memory, giving readers a sense of the person who was and the loss that remains. Again and again as I read, I found myself reading lines aloud to those around me, Espada's gift for choose the unexpected, but apt, description and his ability to create juxtapositions that illuminates corners we didn't know existed are show more stunning. show less

Ringing with tones of fable and of history, this collection is Espada at his best. While each poem is itself a graceful story with clear images and accessible language, each poem is also only a small part of the larger collection that comes together as a focused exploration of various events and persons of Latin America. Whether readers are familiar with Espada's inspirations or not, however, they'll find that the stories and emotions set up here are well worth exploring. Espada is a master show more at focusing his language and poetics in such a tight and lyrical manner as to reach even the most cynical reader, whether that reader might regularly enjoy poetry or not. Simply, this is a collection for anyone with an interest in poetry, in events and persons written into literature, or simply with an interest in beautiful words and literature. Absolutely recommended for any reader. This will stand as one of my favorite poetry collections of all time. show less

Martin Espada is a Brooklyn born and raised poet of Puerto Rican heritage. His 'Rebellion is the cirlce of a lover's hands' is a very interesting poetry collection at least if you're interested in the kind of social and political commentary it contains. Personally I am--and the one poet he reminds me more of than any other is Philip Levine--maybe mixed in a little bit with the great Nicanor Parra. One might say he is a Latino comparable to Levine anyway. Levine's work has always celebrated show more his Jewish working class upbringing--one can almost see and smell the factory floor in his poems--one rises at dawn and sets off for work or even works the graveyard shift. It's a hard life--full of struggle and very little appreciation if any but the protagonists of his poems are not only workers they are survivors who find solace in the small things.

With Espada we get much the same but he reaches maybe even a little further--whether Puerto Ricans, Mexicanos or Central Americans for the most part they struggle with the most menial jobs and the subtle and the not so subtle racism too often occuring which comes their way more than less because of skin tone or language pronunciation. Here we have:

Jorge the church janitor finally quits

No one asks
where I am from,
I must be
from the country of janitors,
I have always mopped the floor.
Honduras, you are a squatter's camp
outside the city
of their understanding.

No one can speak
my name,
I host the fiesta
of the bathroom,
stirring the toilet
like a punchbowl.
The Spanish music of my name
is lost
when the guests complain
about toilet paper.

What they say
must be true:
I am smart,
but I have a bad attitude.

No one knows
that I quit tonight,
maybe the mop
will push on without me,
sniffing along the floor
like a crazy squid
with stringy gray tentacles.
They will call it Jorge.

Which shows Espada is not without a sense of humor (at least sometimes) when making a point. Anyway he has interesting and more often than not compelling turns of phrase. Maybe not the lightest touch but I don't think that's a particular goal of his. In any case I think Espada's poetry is worth exploring much further and I would recommend this collection to all the poetry/social critic buffs out there--I would suspect you know who you are already. show less