The lament of Valeria Martinez's book-length poem "Each in Her" is a song of blood, grief, emotion and lifelessness. The poem places the reader in the hot desert of Juarez, Mexico with a story of young women going to work and never returning home. These women were sexually abused, beaten, killed and mangled.
The 2011 Arizona Book Award winner for poetry visited UCF on Thursday on behalf of the Burnett Honors College. Her book, "Each in Her," has been nominated for various awards, including a Pulitzer Prize.
The event was geared toward English and creative writing students and was supervised by the officers of "The Cypress Dome", the student art and literary magazine.
"We were very touched to hear her story and her inspiration," Megan Fletcher, the vice president of "The Cypress Dome" said.
The officers of "The Cypress Dome" wanted Martinez to read to the class to promote submissions for the magazine, which comes out this spring. The reading was part of the English department's "Writers in the Sun" series, which features various writers who speak to the students.
The reading was held in the Nicholson School of Communication and was open to the public during a creative writing theory and practice class taught by Professor Terri Thaxton.
"I'm very happy to be here," Martinez said. "The students that I have been spending time with are extraordinary and are wonderful to talk to."
The poetic novel is a story about the 800 plus women who have been murdered in Juarez, Mexico since 1993. The majority of women killed were maquiladora workers.
The victims were generally reported missing by their families, with their bodies found days or months later abandoned in vacant lots, outlying areas or in the desert. There are several suspects to the masked killings, but the killers have not been identified.
During her hour-long visit, Martinez read the poetic novel in its entirety and answered student's questions after.
"I didn't plan on writing this, especially as a poem because masked murder is usually for another genre," Martinez said.
Martinez refers to the poem as a collage of different threads of different events. The poem started with Martinez setting the scene.
"We sit up straight, eyes red-rimmed after a spanking in the restroom of the
Shangri-La Chinese restaurant. Juarez, 1996."
At the end she named a fraction of the women murdered in Juarez. The list of names was extensive, and she read it as if it were a monologue. With every gasp between phrases she looked at the students as she described the story of rape, struggle, burnings and beatings of women.
Martinez was inspired to write the piece after watching a live performance of a Latina dance project. The dance was an illustration of the murders that took place in Juarez.
"That's what opened the doors," Martinez said.
She couldn't remember any other part of the evening, even her ride home. All she could think about the dance, and the women of Juarez and their murders. Before she knew it, she had pages of work.
The novel-length poem resonated strong with the students who attended the reading.
"As a composer, I heard nothing but music as she was reading," Tom Mundy, a senior English major, said. "It was just beautiful."
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