Edward J. CarvalhoEric B. SaloOscar Sarmiento et - Acknowledged Legislator. Critical Essays on the Poetry of Martín Espada

Acknowledged Legislator

FAIRLEIGH DICKINSON UNIVERSITY PRESS

Madison Teaneck

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Acknowledged Legislator : Critical Essays on the Poetry of Martn Espada / edited by Edward J. Carvalho.

pages cm.

ISBN 978-1-61147-641-5 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-61147-642-2 (ebook)

1. Espada, Martn, 1957Criticism and interpretation. I. Carvalho, Edward J., editor of compilation.

PS3555.S53Z54 2014

811'.54dc23

2013050397

TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

This book is dedicated with appreciation to the following individuals:

Martn Espada for his generosity, mentorship, activism, and most of all, his poetry;

Henry Giroux, whose important critical theories have taught me to read Espadas poetry through the lens of critical pedagogy and as a response to the crisis of neoliberalism;

Beatrix Gates, my initial MFA advisor at Goddard College, for recommending and introducing me to Espadas work;

and Frank Espada (19302014), whose humanism and artistic sensitivity defined the very spirit and sacrifice of an acknowledged legislator.
In memoriam.

Interview statements and e-mail correspondence from Martn Espada used with permission.

Cordillera; Heart of Hunger; The Immigrant Iceboys Bolero; Mrs. Baez [sic] Serves Coffee on the Third Floor; The Night Watchmans Indentured Servitude; One-Night Stand in the Milk of an Industrial Moon; Tato Hates the New York Yankees from TheImmigrantIceboysBolero by Martn Espada. Copyright 1982 by Martn Espada. Used by permission of the author.

Again the Mercenaries: Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua, 4th of July 1982; El seor est muerto; From an Island You Cannot Name; Los Sures; Mariano Explains Yanqui Colonialism to Judge Collings; The Moon Shatters on Alabama Avenue; Pinball Between Madhouses; The Spanish of Our Out-Loud Dreams; Toque de queda: Curfew in Lawrence; Trumpets from the Islands of Their Eviction; Watch Me Swing; Water, White Cotton, and the Rich Man; We Live by What We See at Night from TrumpetsfromtheIslandsofTheirEviction by Martn Espada. Copyright 1987, 1994 by Martn Espada and Bilingual Press/Editorial Bilinge, Tempe, Arizona. Used by permission of the author and Bilingual Press/Editorial Bilinge.

Bully (Buscabulla); Clementes Bullets (Las balas de Clemente); Colibr (Colibr); Federicos Ghost (El fantasma de Federico); Julio Signing His Name (Julio firmando su nombre); The King of Books (El Rey de los Libros); La Tumba de Buenaventura Roig (La tumba de Buenaventura Roig); Moving Day in the Financial District (Di de mudanza en el distrito financiero); Portrait of a Real Hijo de Puta (Retrato de un verdadero hijo de puta); Rebellion is the Circle of a Lovers Hands (Pelln and Nina) (Rebelin es el giro de manos del amante [Pelln and Nina]); Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3, 1877 (Dos mexicanos linchados en Santa Cruz, California, 3 de mayo, 1877) from RebellionistheCircleofaLoversHands/Rebelineselgirodemanosdelamante. Copyright by Martn Espada. Translation Copyright Camilo Prez-Bustillo and Martn Espada. Used by permission of the author and Northwestern University Press.

The Admiral and the Snake; Blackballed by the Rainbow Girls; Borofels; The Broken Window of Rosa Ramos; City of Coughing and Dead Radiators; Coca-Cola and Coco Fro; Cockroaches of Liberation; Day of the Dead on Wortman Avenue; The Hidalgos Hat and a Hawks Bell of Gold; The Lesson of My Uncles Nose; Mi Vida: Wings of Fright; The Other Alamo; The Skull Beneath the Skin of the Mango; Tires Stacked in the Hallways of Civilization; White Birch; Who Burns for the Perfection of Paper; The Year I Was Diagnosed with a Sacrilegious Heart from CityofCoughingandDeadRadiators by Martn Espada. Copyright 1993 by Martn Espada. Used by permission of W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

All the People Who Are Now Red Trees; Because Clemente Means Merciful; Cada puerco tiene su sabado [sic]; The Foremans Wallet; The Fugitive Poets of Fenway Park; The Good Liar Meets His Executioners; Governor Wilson of California Talks in His Sleep; Hands Without Irons Become Dragonflies; Her Toolbox; Imagine the Angels of Bread (Imagina los angeles de pan); The Meaning of the Shovel; My Twenty-Fifth Year Amazed the Astrologers; Offerings to an Ulcerated God; The Piata Painted with a Face Like Mine; Public School 190, Brooklyn 1963; Rain Delay: Toledo Mud Hens, July 8, 1994; The Sign in My Fathers Hands; Sing in the Voice of a God Even Atheists Can Hear; Sleeping on the Bus; Thieves of Light; When the Leather Is a Whip from ImaginetheAngelsofBread by Martn Espada. Copyright 1996 by Martn Espada. Used by permission of W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

Another Nameless Prostitute Says the Man Is Innocent; I Apologize for Giving You Poison Ivy By Smacking You in the Eye With the Crayfish at the End of My Fishing Line; The Carpenter Swam to Spain; For the Jim Crow Mexican Restaurant in Cambridge, Massachusetts Where My Cousin Esteban was Forbidden to Wait Tables Because He Wears Dreadlocks; Genuflection in Right Field; The Ghost in the Trunk of the Car; My Name Is Espada; The River Will Not Testify; Pegao; Pitching the Potatoes from AMayanAstronomerinHellsKitchen by Martn Espada. Copyright 2000 by Martn Espada. Used by permission of the author and W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

Again the Mercenaries: Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua, 4th of July 1982; Watch Me Swing. Copyright 1987 by Martn Espada; Alabanza: In Praise of Local 100; Bully; Circle Your Name; En la calle San Sebastin; Now the Dead Will Dance the Mambo. Copyright 2003 by Martn Espada; Tato Hates the New York Yankees; Cordillera; Heart of Hunger; Mrs. Bez Serves Coffee on the Third Floor. Copyright 1982 by Martn Espada; The River Will Not Testify. Copyright 2000 by Martn Espada; Thieves of Light; Who Burns for the Perfection of Paper. Copyright 1993 by Martn Espada; from Alabanza by Martn Espada. Used by permission of the author and W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

The Caves of Camuy; Not Here; The Republic of Poetry; Something Escapes the Bonfire; Stone Hammered to Gravel from TheRepublicofPoetry