OUR POETRY ARCHIVE FEATURED
POET OF THE MONTH
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ
JULY 2018
ALICJA KUBERSKA: What does poetry mean to you?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Everything that exists
is a form of poesy. Poetry is by far beauty, evolution, revolution,
transformation, sublimation and healing source.
ALICJA KUBERSKA: What’s according to
you the meaning of poetry in the contemporary world?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Poetry is a
revolutionary force. Guards the spiritual, moral and social responsibilities
that seek universal brotherhood, justice where there is abuse, peace where
there is confrontation, love where there is hatred, beauty where there is
dreariness. Gabriel Celaya believed that poetry is a weapon loaded with future.
It certainly carries on its shoulders all the struggles and victories of our
people. For poetry urges change, renewal,
cultural bliss and humanistic wisdom. Also, poetry touches all souls.
Transformation is a poetic deed.
ALICJA KUBERSKA:
Can you describe your creative process while writing a new poem?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: It never is a plan. Poetry comes
to me at any moment and I must grab it then or it flies away into another
direction. I write – nonstop - until I feel I have reached the full force of
it. If not, I leave it dormant. Afterwards I read it all, edit the less
possible.
ALICJA KUBERSKA:
Did it happen to you that a poem was just your dream?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ:
Yes. Lucid dream!
ALICJA KUBERSKA: Tell us about your inspiration.
What’re the most important subjects to you?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Lately are the social
issues, women’s issues, children’s issues, that have more weight into my
writing. For I have a responsibility as
a poet, I do take very seriously the silenced voices and try to convey all
possible mirrors to seek a response from this estrangement that is killing our
sense of empathy and justice.
MARIA MIRAGLIA: Which were
the emotions that inspired your first verses?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Love! Or was it a
mystic trance?
MARIA MIRAGLIA: Was your aspiration to become a poet or did
all happen by chance?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: I was always a poet at heart. For
why I would fetch little orphaned birds from fallen nests and take home with
me? Therefore, poetry awakened in me at an early age. I believe that we all have that soul binding
force within us.
MARIA MIRAGLIA: Who is the
first person you read your poems to and why?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: I read to a friend
that believes in poetry and because this soul has greater sensibility as to trust
that poetry is an act of loving oneself and others, and poems are sublimated
cosmos and fractal mirrors too.
MARIA MIRAGLIA: Have you
published any poetic anthology, if so what did you feel the first time you got
it in your hands?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Yes, I have published
anthologies in English and Spanish. The first time to clasp it in my hands is a
very emotional moment, like holding a “colibrí” (humming bird).
MARIA MIRAGLIA: Who are the
poets you prefer reading? Do you get inspiration from them?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: I prefer to read poets
that are giving all their spirit and mind for the true nature of poetry.
APRILIA ZANK: How
important is accessibility of meaning to you? Do you challenge the readers to
work hard to decipher your poems, or do you prefer transparency of meaning?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: A poem is always to be read with soul and
mind and while it requires deciphering the poet’s intention and message, it
shall never be a mystery undiscovered. More, like a communion, where the reader
also attaches strings to itself, relates to those feelings, see things that
were not intended originally in the poem, gives a new dimension to it, because each one reads according to own
history of life and perspectives. Meaning and Transparency are qualities that
shall be balanced.
APRILIA ZANK: What kind
of poems do you write mostly? Do you have recurring themes, or are all your
poems unique?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Lately, I am writing
more about social issues, but also eco-poetry and soul binding emotions
(spiritual), salt poetry (a challenge). But yes, I consider each poem unique in
essence, even if the theme is a recurrent one, like “love”.
APRILIA ZANK: Do you think
your poetry is typically feminine / masculine? If yes, in what way?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Poetry is soul, not
genre. One could say however that there are instances in which feminine and
masculine seem to be two ways into poetry, still I feel as oneness, not totally
differentiated.
APRILIA ZANK: Do you write
mostly about yourself, or do you also have an open eye /ear for the issues of
the world?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: I hardly write about
myself, even if I write as if about myself. Feelings are inherent to anyone and
all, like mirror neurons, like echoes in the brain and skin. And yes, I do keep
wide open eyes and ears to worldwide issues and react and act upon it, hoping
for empathy and possibly change.
APRILIA ZANK: In what way
is your poetry different from that of other poets?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: I write it, that makes
it different already, in the unpretentious sense of it. For I follow into my instinct, Luz’s burst of feelings,
burst of conscience, burst of own mirrors. Doesn’t we all? (Wink)
LEYLA IŞIK: What are the main
factors to make poetry real poetry?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Poetry is not an ego
trip; otherwise it is an act of profanation. Poetry is pure and serves causes.
Not individualistic agendas.
LEYLA IŞIK: Do you think imagery
is important in poetry? Where does the importance of imagery begin in a poem,
where does it end?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: We get hit by an
image, be it visual, tactile, dreamy, a memory, a feeling, any image! It is the
entryway into a poem, the sphere of the senses and emotions with which the poet
will get all entangled. A poem is largely a flow of images dancing before the
eyes (mind). It finishes when we feel that we have gotten past the momentum
into its closure. But that is perhaps the mechanical part, for we are still
pulsing.
LEYLA IŞIK: What are the most
used types of poetry in your country?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: Actually, there is a
trend of activism, poetry that denounces and claims spaces of justice and
reformation, a poetry to awaken the nation and subvert all inconformity into
actions. But truly is not new, for Puerto Rico has a history of scholarly poets
fighting a cause: liberty and the rooting of own traditions and cultural
heritage before the foreign imposition. Puerto Ricans are defined by a complex
history. There is not singular Puerto Rican standpoint or character. We are a
million things. But we are poets; an armed force of poetry dating back to the Aboriginal
times (before Columbus). And it is a rich and diverse.
LEYLA IŞIK: What’s important to
be a good poet? To write good poems!
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: A good poet does not
write poetry to gain any recognition. A good poet writes out of own pain, own
pulses, writes to convey significance, to awaken consciences, souls, skins and
also to sublimated the word into the most beautiful form of speech.
LEYLA IŞIK:
Who are the most important poets and their main properties nowadays?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: “Fill the paper with
the breathing of your heart.” - William Wordsworth. That is a hard question to
answer for there are poets that have become the universal essence of the truest
meaning of poetry. Poets that we shall read if we consider ourselves poets,
like Whitman, Neruda, Keats, Sor Juana, Julia de Burgos, Khayyam, to mention a
few, and there are the contemporary poets whose contribution is not only
beautiful but influential in terms of filling the paper with what is vital and
undying. Those are the properties.
DEBORAH BROOKS LANGFORD: Understanding poetry begins with
visualizing the central images in the poem. What do you see, taste, smell,
hear, and feel? What is the imagery of your poetry?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: The momentum, the thunder
that drives the hand to the paper. Then, imagery is a collision of all possible
VISIONS humming around the triggering force behind the poem. Each poem holds a
unique imagery inherent to it, so to say. But in poetry, all senses are
connected pathways.
DEBORAH
BROOKS LANGFORD: What is the mood of your poetry? (Or How does
it make you feel?)
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: A flowing mood! Don’t
feel the same way every time I write a poem. It makes me feel inwards and outwards
towards something bigger than my own frame of mind, a boomerang effect where I get
hit back and strike others too.
DEBORAH
BROOKS LANGFORD: In your poetry who is the speaker of the
poem? Are you speaking to yourself or to others?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: So many times while
speaking to myself, I am really speaking to others, even if it sounds
contradictory. I am sure you all understand that. But most of the time is to
others that I speak, to those that can find themselves and others in those
words, and maybe, and hopefully something happens too! Like activism against
violence, compassion, mindfulness, understanding.
DEBORAH
BROOKS LANGFORD: What is the message of your poetry? What messages does your poetry convey?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: One message that I
never convey in my poetry is hate. All the others are sheltered in the Luz’s
realm of poetic emotions and goodness of heart.
DEBORAH BROOKS LANGFORD:
Does the internet and social media contribute to the success of your
poetry? Is this the reason you write for?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: The success, whatever success, is tied to my
writing style and the sense of poetry significance that I might have conveyed.
However, never to underestimate the power of internet and social media as tools
to relate to others in this poetic universe, where everything convenes, collides,
diffuses and gets forgotten too. I write not because of gratification with
“success”. It is an act of my own soul who has reasons to relate to others, be
the others, in this universe needed of incommensurable healing.
NILAVRONILL SHOOVRO: Thank you so much dear poet for the interview.
We would like to know your personal experience with OPA as a literary web
journal. Would you like to share anything more with our readers?
LUZ MARÍA LÓPEZ: OPA is a vital and
reliable web journal. Here we can meet the best contemporary poets of the world,
being certain of its commitment to quality, fostering diverse cultures and
languages and poetic friendships as well.
LUZ MARÍA
LÓPEZ is a
poet, narrator, editor, translator, cultural promoter and activist from Puerto
Rico – Caribbean. She is the author of five poetry collections, Editor-in-chief
and compiler of the book "Poetic Voices of the New Century”, Spanish
edition, Kafla Intercontinental, (India, 2016). Editor of the anthologies
"Autism Awareness", published by the Platform of Social Journalism
"Different Truths" (India, 2017; 2018). Author featured in the book
"Six Important Contemporary Poets of the World" (Adorn, 2017),
presented at the International Summit of Poets of Dhaka, Bangladesh,
translations to bangla by Aminur Rahman; Dhaka World Anthology of Poetry
(Adorn, 2018); International Poetry Festival José María Heredia - World Poetry
Anthology (2017), compiled by Jorge Contreras Herrera. Is also featured in the
Anthology of Caribbean, compiled, and translated to mandarin by Dr. Kuei-shien
Lee (Republic of China, 2018). She has also participated in multiple
multilingual international anthologies. Her poems have been translated to more
than fifteen languages and published in literary magazines in America, Asia and
Europe, among them: "Kalashree", Nepali Literary Magazine; Tadjeed
Institute for Literature and the Arts (Iraq), KABIKHANTA, (Bangladesh),
"The Vineyard Poetry Quarterly", (Taiwan, 2017); Krytia Journal of
Poetry ", (India). She also publishes academic articles on psychosocial
aspects of gender, which are widely circulated on websites, magazines and
blogs. Continental Director of World Festival of Poetry (CED- WFP) World Poetic
Front in Defense of the Women’s Rights (WM) International Book Fair in Puerto
Rico (FILEMH): Organizing Committee WFP
Poetic Holiness Sanctuaries, India (2016) – Main coordinator. Organizer of
multiple poetic events in Puerto Rico "Kathak Literature Prize",
International Poetry Summit of Dhaka, Bangladesh (2017) Honorary President of
the Universal Writers’ Encounter, Colombia, 2017 "Shaan-E-Adab", XI
Intercontinental Congress of Literature, XI International Writers' Festival,
Udaipur, India (2016) "Inspiring Universal Poet", International
Poetry Festival, Accra, Ghana (2016)Her poetry touches themes tied to
spirituality, nature, women's issues, social protest and the inherent passion
subordination. www.luzmlopez.com
