Learning

As I sat down to write this, I wanted to talk about my struggle to read as a child and my youthful fear of poetry. I’ve long thought I didn’t grow up in poetry, but now, as I write, I realize that I’m being narrower with myself than I would be with others. I didn’t learn to read until third grade, but I had been learning poetry my whole life.

Growing up in the South with a Peruvian father, we told tales of tios and cousins, folklores and legends of incredible feats. I was surrounded by languages intertwining with one another and coming up with their own, but I didn’t yet recognize them as poetry. Even once I could read, poetry felt out of my grasp.

After growing more confident in my reading ability, I spent most of my youth at the library—my parents being big fans of both free AC and free entertainment—but it took me a long time to finally wander over to the poetry section. I preferred to choose books by grabbing several at a time and bringing them to a table where I would read as many as I could before taking any leftover books home.

But with poetry, I was lost. I can still smell the dusty volumes of thick poetry collections in the small library’s aisles. I was only ten and grabbed the first name I felt held any weight: Wordsworth. With a name like that, I knew I couldn’t lose. Besides, the book looked old, and I was sure if I was going to start on poetry, I needed to start at what I thought was the beginning. 

I kept that book for longer than the twenty-one days initially allowed, but no matter what angle I took, how many times I tried, I couldn’t see a connection between what he did and what I knew of language. He was using words I thought I understood but not in ways I understood. I had never felt so lost in my life, and I didn’t open another book of poetry for almost a decade after that. 

Now, as an editor, I’ll admit I am still trepidatious. What do I know of lofty language? Of pastoral landscapes and highly educated, philosophical thoughts? But the truth is, I do know poetry. Yes, I have tackled—and appreciated—Wordsworth, but my education in poetry didn’t stop at that little library in Little Rock. 

I remember reading my first literary magazine from cover to cover: a special issue on South American writers, an issue I still have to this day. I found in that magazine, and many magazines since, that the emotion poetry evokes—joys, pain, hunger—comes in different voices, some that even sounded like my own. I have studied and loved Shakespeare, but I’ve also learned to love the language of folklore and legends, from Pachamama to haunted hospitals in the small towns of Arkansas, the Spanish that stutters from my tongue, the country phrasing of my mother, the narrative, and the experiential. 

I love to tell people how I was a delayed reader, but how once I learned, I was addicted. I will brag about all the markers I quickly surpassed, finishing high school English before the end of sophomore year or some inconsequential test score; I’ll laugh about hiding my books under my desk to read, about how I will read any genre whenever I can, about how one of the best perks of being an editor is getting free galleys. Still, none of that gets at the truth of my reading story. The truth is, I’m still learning to read. 

Every time I open a poem or manuscript, it teaches me how to understand its language, connecting me to the speaker through idioms, metaphors, images, tones, and more. Poetry has been teaching me since I was a child, when I didn’t even know it was there. I’m learning to read the language I grew up with, I’m learning from writers I have worked under and those I’ve never met, and I’m thrilled to have a new opportunity as guest editor to continue this journey.

So for that, readers and writers, I thank you. I am eager to study at your feet, and I’m especially excited to see what we all create together for the Flyover Country and Translation folios. Thank you for your faith in me and for all you will teach. I’m ready to learn.