Q:1. How did you decide on what poems to send?

What a great question!
When the invitation came, I felt the ears of a few poems perk up. Still shrouded in fog, lingering on sandstone outcrops of expression, they leaned over the jagged cliff of my awareness and jumped onto the page. What else could I do, but follow their trail?

Q:2. What poetic form did it take, and why?

Initially, this narrative was a running one to just keep up with the flow of information/sensations.
But because many people may not know about Olmec deities, I realized I needed to slow the content down so people could take it in whether or not they were familiar with this magnificent creature.
Choosing to do it in parts allowed both me as the narrator and the readers/listeners who would follow the lines on the page and opportunity to pause and reflect/take in more deeply what was being ‘said’.

Q:3. How did you use the whiteness of the page in your poem?

The whiteness is background music upon which the words (lyrics) are written (by a non-musician) in sync with the beats of my breath. (After all, it really is a song). There are times, such as in this piece, where too much focus or interplay with the background dilutes/distracts the immediacy of the words.

Q:4. How did you decide on the title of your poem?

This may have been my most intentionally strategic moment. I wanted to capture in as few words as possible this poem’s mythical time and space; anchor it in pre-Mesoamerica (Olmec) cosmology, gambling that the curious would take time to look up the word Olmec. More important to me, however, was how to handle the potential obscurity of Cipactli. I decided to make this being as accessible as possible by first introducing it as Crocodile, which most people are familiar with.

Q:5. Imagery, or narrative. Which was more important to you in writing the poem?

Honestly, my first task was to capture the basic heartbeat (pulse) and then, with focus, to flush out that tone with as much specific imagery (physicality) as felt necessary.

Q:6. What do you think of where your poem is placed in the collection?

God, Paul, I hope you don’t think I’m ‘way out there’ but my responses are true to my thinking & understanding of the way of the world. So:
In the #6 spot, this poem is near the collection’s midpoint, which is between the book’s heaven and earth. A fitting place for a supranatural (not supernatural) meeting of human and deity. I think Alan did a masterful job of weaving the 14 poem strands together.

Q:7. Once they have read your poem, what do you hope the reader will leave with?

My hope is that readers experience a sense of the relationship (interconnectedness) of all things seen and unseen. That such interplay, which keeps us evolving, can be both harsh and wondrous.

Bios and Links

Karen Pierce Gonzalez

is an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in numerous print and online publications, radio shows, and podcasts. Her chapbooks include Coyote in the Basket of My Ribs (Kelsay Books), True North and Sightings from a Star Wheel (Origami Poems Project), and forthcoming Down River with Li Po (Black Cat Poetry Press). Writing credits also include several short plays staged through Fringe Festival of Marin (USA).

With degrees in creative writing, anthropological linguistics, and folklore, she is also a former journalist and folklore columnist who now hosts a quarterly ‘Get Ekphrastic with Folk Art’ blogzine on FolkHeart Press. Other current projects include a series of videos based upon 1) original folktales/legends and 2) imagined prequels/sequels to fables and fairy tales.

Her visual artistry focuses primarily upon assemblage art based upon elements found in nature (tree bark, bird nests, etc.). To date, 50+ of her art pieces, including six cover images, have been or are scheduled to be published in a range of literary journals/magazines.

And she gets to do all that in the verdant rural landscape of San Francisco’s North Bay.


Links: linktr.ee/KPGFolkHeart