Chuparosa: Borrowed from Mexican Spanish: "hummingbird, any of various plants whose flowers attract hummingbirds," from Spanish chupa, 3rd person singular present tense of chupar "to suck" (probably of imitative origin) + rosa "rose" (in part borrowed from, in part going back to Latin).

 

I was enthralled by the strength and fragility in the images of “My Maternal Grandmother Crosses the Border with a Rose in Her Mouth” – from the first image of a woman as a hummingbird surviving in the desert to the procession of black lace mantillas suggesting reverence, beauty, and mourning for what is being left behind.

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I imagine her hands shaking as she crosses the bridge or hears the whip crack or cuts her hands on thorns. The rose as love and fidelity and violence, and often associated with the Virgin Mary. Similarly, the word “crosses” appears multiple times. Is there anything else that the rose symbolizes? As you have written about religion before, I am curious if there is overlap here.

 

I didn’t intend overlap in regards to the rose, per se, but there is always a thread of faith or religion in the majority of my poems, intentional or not. I was raised Catholic and still practice my faith, and like a lot of cradle Catholics, the images and rituals of the Church seep into daily life in unexpected ways. For me, it’s my poems.

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The epazote, lavender, and tea herbs gathered from the earth (the feminine) contrast “the boots, the badges, the guns” (the masculine) that are still so violently emblematic of what it means to risk one's life to cross a border. Merging (but not necessarily reconciling) these worlds with the last red image worked well.

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What research did you do in writing this poem?

 

I did a lot of research on border crossing at this time period and it was often so violent even compared to today. I thought it would be easier, somehow, but racism and fear of “the other” was not only more prominent, but more practiced. The whips were actually used, which is just horrifying. Compared to now, the key overlaps are that those who cross over are still often seen as “the other.” I mean, guards taking away water left for them, putting kids in cages, all of it screams that migrants are not quite as human or worthy as whites. My biological history is complicated, of course, as I am adopted. I discovered the obituary of my maternal grandmother in the newspaper about ten or twelve years ago and did genealogical research on her. I found out through this that she crossed the border into Texas when she was about four. This poem came from that.

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I also appreciated the poem's selflessness. I recently wrote about my great-grandmother’s wartime experiences and struggled to admit gaps in my knowledge, like your speaker does with “I imagine this” and “I fill in the story, the colors.” Coming from academia, I feel pressure to be exact and to cite sources. How do you feel about these lines (of yours)? Are they apologia to the reader?

 

I combine research and imagination in this poem (and a lot of my poems — see my second book, The Wishing Tomb, which is a lyrical historical narrative of New Orleans). I write about my birth family quite a bit as I only know bits and pieces that I’ve collected from documents and conversations with birth relatives. I want to know more, I imagine more, and this desire, combined with factual knowledge, was the driving force behind this poem.

 

 

What are your reading now? Have your tastes changed?

 

My tastes are always changing, especially as I age! When I was younger, about twenty years ago, I was reading a lot of more experimental poets like Matthea Harvey (who I still adore), but now I want poems that are more visceral and accessible, that speak quietly but still manage to knock you about. I am a book reviewer for literary magazines, so I have access to a lot of poets. I’m really enjoying British poets at the moment: Carol Ann Duffy, Jen Campbell, Alice Oswald, and Emily Berry.

 

As far as American poets, I would buy anything written by Katie Ford, Marie Howe, Mary Ruefle, Carolyn Forché, and Jericho Brown. I also read a lot of nonfiction (Lucy Worsley is amazing) and fiction. I’m a huge Agatha Christie fan. I love a good cozy mystery — it’s my happy place. I’m currently reading the collections This Strange Garment by Nicole Callihan and Inconsolable Objects by Nancy Miller Gomez for review, as well as The Paris Novel by Ruth Reichl and the nonfiction anthology, Women of the Catholic Imagination, edited by Haley Stewart, for fun.

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