Letras Latinas, Part 4: A Conversation with Juan Felipe Herrera

Listen in to 2024 MacArthur Foundation Fellow and former U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera, interviewed by then Notre Dame MFA candidate in poetry and graduate student Luis Lopez-Maldonado. As a poet, educator, and writer, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation recognizes Herrera for “uplifting Chicanx culture and amplifying shared experiences of solidarity and empowerment.” In this oral history conversation Herrera and Lopez-Maldonado uncover the insight to be gained from playing with language, the value of nurturing one’s art accompanied by close friends, and why both individuals and communities should answer the call to write.

Thanks for listening! The ThinkND Podcast is brought to you by ThinkND, the University of Notre Dame's online learning community. We connect you with videos, podcasts, articles, courses, and other resources to inspire minds and spark conversations on topics that matter to you — everything from faith and politics, to science, technology, and your career.

• Learn more about ThinkND and register for upcoming live events at think.nd.edu.
• Join our LinkedIn community for updates, episode clips, and more.

Transcript

0:06

We are at the University of Notre Dame in the state of Indiana. I have the pleasure today of interviewing the United States Poet Laureate, Playwright, Cartoonist, Performer, Teacher, and Activist, Juan Felipe Herrera. Good morning and welcome to the Institute of Latino Studies. Good morning, Luis. Muchas gracias. Thank you. for archival purposes, may you please state your full name, date of birth, and birthplace. Juan Felipe Herrera, December 27th, 1948, in Fowler, California. Yes, California. Great. Let's begin with Juan Felipe's start. Childhood. Tell us about your childhood. Where did you grow up? What do you remember the most during this time? I grew up, I grew up moving. I grew up in, in the valley in Central Valley of California as a child. I was a little kid. and, trailer that my father had made. Out of wood, there was one room, and, with a door, and it was kinda squarish, and he built it on top of a car he found, and I buried it in a hill, and I think he chopped off the top, I forgot, that's how I remember it, and then he put that one room on top of that chassis with the wheels. And the way I saw it was he did that so he could move, so he could move the house. It was like a little, a Chicano Winnebago. Yeah. And, so that's what it was. And he had this giant, incredible, the sizes were so odd, the nine, it was like a forties army truck that he got, and I'm sure he got either in Nezquite, southern Nuevo Mexico. He actually got it at an auction in Fort Bliss. I don't know where he got it, but he had to have gotten it, purchased it in that area.'cause he also used to hang out, have family also in Las Cruces in the small towns outside of Las Cruces, which I just discovered in 2010. So I've had two lives with families, my own only child, family, traveling in that box. Little smaller box, which was a house. moved by a, an immense truck that was an army truck. So that's how I grew up. But, and then later, 2010, not that long ago, I met my, my sisters and brother out of a long, a larger group of brothers and sisters who had passed away already because they were in their nineties and, she, one of my sisters is in her nineties and mid nineties and my other sister is in 80 is around 87. So I go over there now and visit. but my early years, we were in that, famous, one room bred loaf being pushed by, or carried by, my father's army truck to the small towns until, 1955. we stopped for a little while in Escondido, which was a very revelatory time for me. It was beautiful because it was a little ranchito. Maybe a half an acre that my father worked for Mr., it wasn't Mr., I want to say for Mr. Garcia, who, didn't have any papers, yet he owned the house and the land, which was fine, beautiful. Somebody had to, get a little piece of land, and and his, and his children that I made friends with, and a little cat. And his, and I used to feed the pigs, and I used to, the rooster used to chase me, and I used to plant corn with my father. And, he, I would tend the, some part of that little, garden and, plants that my father planted and made sure they grew. but the revelatory moment came when the, Migra appeared one day and took that family out and left in that van. And I knew what was going on because my mother talked about it, and, my father didn't say anything about it. If he did, he talked to my mother, but she told me what was going on, and I was five, five years old, and I saw that happen, and I still remember it. My friends and that family, and all of a sudden, A little micro ranchito was empty, so we just had to get out ourselves. We had to, leave. and we did. And go to, the mountains of Ramona. Another. Every place was another discovery for my father. we're going to do something here and we'll see what we can do. And build from scratch. total scratch. Wow. that's the early times for me. Yeah. a lot of traveling. So yeah, that's, I can see a lot of that in your work, the movement, right? The movement in your poetry and also the love and consideration for animals. Like it all comes from, a place. it does. Yeah, it does. do you remember the first time you read a poem or a book that was a turning point for you? Yeah. Maybe this was when you decided to begin writing and reading as a writer. And if so, what poem or book was that? there's a couple of those. of course I, I really got into, writing. I got into writing in high school, 11th grade, and then I also really got into it, at the university at UCLA. And, because that was like the, the cooking, the rice cooker for me, the frijol cooker, the pomal, the hot grill for me. coming out of, high school, and those last years in high school were potent because that was 1966, 67, and it was potent because we were building up to 1968 and 69, where the, Vietnam War really started to, fall apart. And, the student movement began to really rise up, and the Chicano movement also began to, really, expand. And the farmworkers movement began to really, connect with a lot of, new audiences and global audiences. and, worldwide, revolutions were taking place, especially in Latin America. And the women's movement and the gay lesbian movement. and of course, Black Power Movement, and Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. So you put all that together in those last five years, in the late 60s, 65 through 70, 71, or six years. So that's when I stepped into that stage. of course we didn't know how all that was going to come together. so that's what really, gave me the protein and the atmosphere and the influences and the electricity, to write and vocalize and step on stages and speak out for the community. but the books I would say, the first poems I would say, some of them were just my own. Walkings and amblings through libraries, because I love to do that, and, from, conversations with my wild poetry friends, like Alurista and Associates, and while working with a guitar and just hanging out in coffee houses, Alurista's book, first book, Floricanto, came out in 1971, and it was a revolutionary because it was, Chicano bilingual. Not just bilingual, it was Chicano bilingual. It was, had a, what's called today in quotations, Black English, which is an English dialect. And so he used some jazz, African American jazz words. And, or jazzy words in his poetry. He wrote letters to Emiliano Zapata in this book. He used Nahuatl, Mesoamerican language, and, rise up, power movement words in this book. And, some pachucada, some, borderlands Spanish. So that was very influential. Because I knew him. We used to live together in middle school, and he lived in my place, a little apartment in San Diego, and I lived in his place, a little tiny brick house on the mountains of Tijuana. so that, that was really great for me and for all of us. but the poems, that I may re, that I remember, I think from my own explorations were the ones from Antonina, Anton, nato, the French Surrealist of the twenties and thirties. And, in, in Paris, in France. And his excursions into, Veracruz, into, into, Mexico, to explore the Tarahumara, lifestyle and rituals, most of all the rituals. So he invented language because he got into a ritual language, ritual, incantatory, uh, kind of language, So those poets of that time in Europe, and also then Aludista, who exploded out of nowhere. Yeah. I don't know. He just, one day he just exploded. I don't know, he told me, on, on B Street, it was probably 6th. It was probably 15th and B street and we always lived on B street. I lived on C street and I lived on B street and he lived on B street to be or not to be. And he said, today, Juan, he says, today, from this day on, I'm a Chicano. And he just, I don't know, something happened. with everything going on with all the movements, I think that, that collection I think spoke, right? so adding to this inspiration and electricity that you gained, who are some of the writers that most inspired you in your career as it began to bloom in your early stages? I think after high school, why were you attracted to these writers and how did you use their work to develop or inspires yours? by the late 70s, I think there was a period in the mid 80s, mid 70s where I just didn't write. Maybe, maybe 70, 74, 75, I just cooled out. Because I had done my first book by 74, Rebozos of Love. We have woven sudor de pueblos on our back. I give it like a four line title and I didn't use any page numbers and I didn't use page titles cause I thought that was like old school. Yeah, it's not so old school, come on, let's get the ball rolling. But after that first book, in the mid seventies, I just, I was involved with a lot of community work and I just let that go a bit. And so then I got back on it in the late seventies again. And by the, and that's when I went to Stanford, and then I met up with, Francisco Narcon, and I met up with, Victor Martinez, from Fresno, and, Francisco had come in from, Wilmington, L. A., and we both met at Stanford University, we We're probably the only Chicanos at the Graduate Orientation, and we both just gravitated toward each other and started yapping and talking and hanging out. So then I made good friends with both of them, Victor Martinez and Francisco D'Arcon, and they were just monstrous readers in literature, monstrous. So I had two teachers, Francisco D'Arcon would talk about the Brazilian poets, Luiz de Camões, he would talk about, Fernando Pessoa, and he would talk about, then he would move up and talk about Borges, then we'll talk about Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and he would just lay it out on me, and I go, oh, wow, okay. Then I would look him up and find new kinds of, types of writing, and of course read some other work. And, Georgie Amato. I also read his work. And Victor talked about, the Yugoslavian, Vasco Popa. I said, Vasco Popa? What on earth is going on here? So I looked up Vasco Popa, and it was great. Yeah. He was great. and on, and we talked about Neruza, and Francisco interviewed Cortaza, and we talked about Cortaza, and Francisco was highly active in interviews with, Latin American poets that come through Stanford at, Fernando Alegria's house in Palo Alto. So then I would hang with Fernando Alegria and Victor and, and Victor and Francisco, and they would be talking about all the things they were doing, and I was just a great, lucky, fortunate recipient of their conversation. Observer. Observer. And then we organized many readings together, the three of us, and we formed a group called Poetas Humanos. And I said, let's put a group together, and let's call it Poetas Humanos after, the great Peruvian César Vallejo. And we talked about César Vallejo. So we know César Vallejo, Vasco Popa, Pablo Neruda, Julio Cortázar, Javier García Márquez, and, Luiz de Camões. And then the poetry got going. So those were high influences, deep influences, international and global influence, Latin American influences. And and in San Francisco, even where we had the previous, Latino, literary project, El Pocho Che, that, had been, had started in the, in the mid seventies or so. And Alejandro Murgia, Roberto Vargas, Nina Serrano, Janice Medichitani, and associates, Cheryl Dinkuzaka. And they were doing a lot of work as writers and poets in San Francisco already, in the community, on their own, doing things, publishing material. So I had the local poets that had been building up poetry, Latino, Latina, multicultural poetry in the Bay Area. And then I had, Victor Martinez, a literary master from Fresno, moving into San Francisco. In the same building where I was, and Francisco D'Arcon, when we were at Stanford, just spitting out all these things about all the things he was doing and reading in the Spanish and Latin American department, Yeah, so I, a lot of community, right? And the importance of having a community as a writer, as an artist, That's right. And a lot of our inspiration comes from that community, I think. That's right. That's where change happens. That's where change happens, and to be right by ourselves is excellent. But you're going to miss all this rich, rich soil, black soil, black and red soil. You're going to miss it. Yeah. Which we need with each other. which kind of touches on the saying, you can't do it all yourself. You can't do it all yourself. You can't do some of it yourself. You're responsible. You're the creator. You're the artist. But the artist needs a palette. Yeah. A very large palette. Can't paint without colors. You can't paint without colors. So talking about community and kind of responsibility. Do you believe we have responsibilities as artists through our work to try to communicate social change? Do you think it is important to make work that provokes audiences to rethink their stance on certain current issues? Rather than just creating work just because arts for art's sake. I remember that, you know that question. That was one of the big questions, that we had in, in the, early seventies, that was a major question, because we had a great, Latin American concerns of artists that were involved in, they wanted to be involved in the revolutions of Central America and, Latin America in general. And they were young intellectuals, we use those words back then. and, there was always a question, is it, are you're doing art for art's sake, we have to do art for social change. so it was a major issue. in the end, at the heart of it, no matter what you write, and if you write it for the people, or if you write it just for yourself, or you write it for your poetry, it is going to flow out. It is going to flow out. we are, everybody's different. The audience has many perspectives, audience, a person has many perspectives. So once you have an audience, you have a zillion perspectives. So it's not just one type of poetry for one type of audience. You don't have to say, let's go out in the streets and protest for ABC causes or cause. You can just express yourself. And from that expression, we'll get insight. We'll gain insight. Just the fact that you're playing with language is insight because Sometimes we don't get to play with language. Sometimes we have to work from, whatever, four in the morning to eleven at night. Yeah. And, and to have a moment to hear someone play with language that we don't have, that the community doesn't have, we go, oh yeah, ah, that's beautiful. we need to see ourselves, doing beautiful things. However, if you say something, Write something that relates to the recent event or just as a supportive, poem and it's a imagination or it's way of speaking, you're speaking in a bilingual, a flow or you're using words that are recognized in this particular community, that's amazing too. the bottom line is that both are highly. Both are highly beautiful and, to divide ourselves in two pieces, we're going to lose something. So the more we embrace abstract, meditative, personal, and social, political, and public is good. Because then we'll have a third voice. Yeah. We'll have a third voice instead of just one. As artists, we all have our definitions of what poetry is or should be. My question is this. Okay. What is poetry to you? What makes a poem? And who has the right to say if poetry is good poetry or bad poetry? That's also one of those debating Every artist you start wrestling on the floor there, throwing tamales on the wall. Enchiladas. Enchiladas on the wall. one of my profs, Marvin Bell, when he reads from Iowa, he says, I just want the audience to know that no one knows what a poem is, and then he starts reading. It's like that, We create categories for things. And, that's good, too. It's very useful. But in art, every artist has always, has said, This is not a painting. Painting is dead. we have to change. Or this is not performance. Yoko Ono, would, would, walk out nude. And, I said, and that was art, and do something, or just sit still, or her and John Lennon were, would be in, in their mat, bed and they would have a sleep in art piece. And you couldn't see them. They had the sheet over themselves and the cameras were all around them. And that was like an interview performance art piece. so is that art? Is that not art? Is that performance? So that's what's beautiful, with creativity. A poem, there really is no, there's definitions of it, from when we teach it. rhythm, meter, theme, symbols, sense, texture, and on, and, strict forms and closed forms, like the sonnet, the villanelle, and then open, forms. But, those are terms on its structures. What's inside the poem is a whole other thing, and of course those structures Can be re refigure. there's many poets laws, writing SSTs, like antis. or extended Ts. Instead of having six stances, they put in nine stances instead of having n words. In a particular format, they change them and put them on, I'll lower the play. so the bottom line is to, be, as creative as possible. Be, try new experiments. do learn, some of the traditional forms. But there's many. There's not just traditional forms that are English and based in the United States or European. There's, traditional forms in all cultures. there's African traditional forms, there's, Caribbean forms. And there's, Mexican, forms and Irish styles, but we don't hear about all of them. So we're gonna go, so I would recommend, getting a global perspective on, on, poetic forms and, materials and writers. so it's a very beautiful field. It's highly open, it's highly creative, it's, it begins with, ceremonial incantations perhaps, from, our ancestors, thousands of years ago. It also, begins with, the stone monuments, that are created, with, hieroglyphics, and also, has been done with stones and seashells. And beads, and healing ceremonies. it's the life of the people, the voice of the people, and the deep core of what really, we have, that moves us forward and to assist the community, the village, and to heal people, and also to play and to have new thoughts and put new things together. And take off our clothes and put ink on the wall. Create art, there's, it's, I'm getting a sense of, there's more than the self in the process of what poetry is, and I think allowing yourself to, like you said, take it globally, I think that will redefine what poetry is, and I think that's wonderful. Going, going a little back to role models, Role models are very important to have, and for any poet, artist, and whether they are beginners, emerging, or like you, a model themselves. As a current plotus, or poet laureate of the United States, you will forever be a role model to most of us Chicanos and Mexican American poets and writers for many years to come. Knowing this, and in reflecting in the honor that you have with this title, What are your future goals in respect to nourishing the next wave of artists? What are Juan Felipe Herrera's plans for the future? I, plans for the future really are the same as they have always been is to, continue writing. And to, assist others to write, and to, call on others to write, our communities to write, to speak up, and to be present. we have an issue of not, we have an issue of having many, for example, Latinas and Latinos in the United States. the num, our numbers are extremely large, and growing every split second. However, our presence is, for some strange reason, is not available. our books that we've written since Alurista's book in 1971, there's many. Roberto Trujillo, the chief archivist at the Special Collections at Stanford University that oversees A Latin American, Chicano, and Iberian collections, wrote an article in August, 1992, came out in the Examiner, San Francisco Examiner, and he said that up until that time, since 1892, there were only a thousand novels that were, Latino oriented or written by Latinas and Latinos, or people who had Latina and Latino names, or people who, were used the Latino, label to write novels. There were only a thousand. So from 1892 to now, there's thousands, to today, 2016. And children's books are just exploring, Latina, Latino children's books. And, and all media, we are highly, representative. Maybe not, zillions, but really producing creatively quite a bit and, the publishers are most anxious to acquire our material in books. However, there's a clincher, our material, such growth of materials, and ourselves as a community, we're not visually, I'm talking about visually, we're not visually present. And in, in the media, and in, in society at large, we walk around, but go to Walmart where at Macy's, we overtake Macy's and we're overtaking Walmart and the theaters, I feel like I'm in Texas in a theater, or I feel like I'm in, Logan Heights when I'm in the theater, but however, in the media and as people speak, It's as if we were like only 10 people. And no one really even knows what a Latino is or Latina is. We think people do. So we're a in, we're in an interesting position. So one of my missions then is to, to, to let people know, or to remind everyone and to, support everyone and becoming more visually present. By speaking, by writing, and perhaps, but just taking photographs and making interviews like yourself. Yeah. here's a big poster, this is what we do. Check it out. Yeah. Check it out. This is what we do here, here in Notre Dame. Yeah. And giant size. If the casinos can put wall sized posters of their wheels that spin around in little numbers and people smiling because they're going to make a million dollars. If they can put a wall sized poster about what they're doing, and of course that's a business and there's many other businesses that do the same thing. We need to see, we need to have our images up there. Otherwise we just recede into the wall. Even though we have produced a lot and accomplished a lot. So I think being present and being vocal and being visible is a major, goal. And I want to assist in that. As you mentioned earlier, times are changing. People are changing and this country is about to change forever because of the next presidential election. With that said, in your eyes, how does the future look for poetry and art in general? Do you believe more people will try expressing themselves due to the fact that our country is at war, and race, gender, class, and education, among others, are the bullets to America's loaded guns? of course I don't believe in guns. and I know what you're saying. we're facing a challenge. We're facing a challenge because the humanities in K 12 are eroded, are eroding, and they're being pushed out. And, and in the universities as well, they're not really seen as having a value as much as, let's say, the sciences or are, the life sciences. And on, labs, and, physics, and, astrophysics, which are all exciting, totally exciting. Those are amazing fields. finding, unambiguous star systems through particular kinds of, optics called pipelines. those are excellent. But, like I was mentioning last night about Einstein, who used poetic moments to find a new way of approaching problems that he encountered in his formulas, about the theory of relativity, we do need, the humanities. We do need poetry. We do need art. So that's a problem. So that's a major problem because then that wipes out, creative writing, that wipes out literature, that wipes out visual art. And all the arts, and wipes this out, and dance, and the new types of arts that are emerging. So we're pushing art out into the margins, and we're pushing the techniques and the teaching of the arts out into the margins, and we're pushing the history of the arts. Which are the history of our peoples, peoples who are at the margin create a lot more art than the people at the center. Society is more creative, at the margins, than at the center, and all people are creative. However, at the center, we have the major institutions that move things. and, they're slow moving institutions because they're big and complex. At the margin, there's questions, there's, rebellion, there's, new ways of seeing the world, there's more observation, there's, sharp listening. And there's using whatever materials you can find to create new things and, voices. Voices that are angry. Voices that are questioning. Voices in protest. Voices that are just, isolated and are trying to find a voice even though there are voices. so how do voices that are at the margin then, create art if the arts are, being minimized? perhaps as always, picking up whatever you can, but that's, at this time, with such great advances, it's a highly unequal system. And before, things were you could grab a harmonica, get a guitar, and you hit the streets, like Bob Dylan, or Lead Belly, or, Blind, Lemon, Jefferson, all the blues, early blues rhythm and blues artists and jazz, musicians and painters, but now, we have a very uneven system where the arts are being pushed out, the margins are getting, further out, and the center is getting, more hardened. So it's going to be a question. It's a big question how to go about dealing with that. So we have to promote the humanities. We have to promote literature. We have to promote writing. Even if it is in, in all the arts, even if it is in our little storefronts, we have to find a storefront if it comes to that and open it up and provide, workshops. And we also have to, talk, directly with, our educational institutions and representatives to continue, funding the arts. Because they're highly needed, because that's where critical thinking takes place, and that's where, new ideas are discussed in new ways. We can't discuss new ideas in old ways. you can't ask a person, you can't ask a group. With a car with two wheels to drive far, or you can't ask a person with two, with a car with, you can't ask a group with automobiles with two wheels to think of an automobile with 10 wheels. Cause what's, you got to go to three wheels and you got to go four wheels, something like that. That's a kind of a weird analysis, but, it's a critical time. And of course the internet is a new art space. The internet is a new art space. Even though we have in our mind that the internet is global, it's global to particular groups. That's not global to all people, because people, some people don't even have houses. And people don't necessarily have shoes, not all people. And people don't necessarily have food, or schools, or medicine, or hospitals, or doctors. they don't have any access to the internet, or laptops, or little, smart phones. It looks like it does, they do, to our eyes, because we're involved in this world, this internet world. But there's millions and millions of people that do not have any access at all. So we have to think globally, truly globally, and we have to think ways of sharing information. We have to think of ways of making literature and writing and poetry vibrant, more vibrant every day. I have here a copy of your most recent book titled Notes on the Assemblage, and may you do thus the honor of reading one of your favorite poems. How are you going to do that? And if you can you share a little bit about how, if you remember, how you wrote it or what inspired that specific poem? Okay. How I wrote it and all that stuff? Yeah, like where were you at McDonald's writing your sketch pad or? Okay. Okay. I like to sketchpad a lot and, but yeah, I really do. I, I'm going to, yeah, I'm going to see what I can read here. Cause they all have, stories. Every one of these has a story and I enjoy getting into a poem. there's writing the poem and there's the poem and there's getting into the poem. And that's always extremely tasty. It's like going to have a big giant plate of enchilada. Yeah, when you're hungry. And, here's an interesting one. It's called Notes on the Assemblage, just like the book. Yeah. And, and let's see, these are all my favorites. Some I actually don't read for some strange reason. like the Tikhnat Khan, my Step With You poem. I don't read that. let me let me read that one, since I never read it. Let's give that little poem a little room here in the world. Thich Nhat Hanh, I Step With You. Step, breathe, step, breathe. Peace flickers at the end of the flame. You sit, you speak, one word, yet the word is impossible. Rice, brown and eggplant, soup, green, violet. Your mind, still, for peace. Decade upon decade, bowing, speaking, lifting the dead from your shoulders, our hands. This is how you walk. One step, we walk with you. One step there, a breath as we walk with you. You go as we go. I enjoy that poem. I've, I think it's the first time I've read it. And for some reason, I don't read that one. There's other ones I don't read. And they're just waiting to be read. They're in the, they're revving up. Incubators. Yeah, they're little incubators. They're revving up and the moment will come. This one, Thich you. He was very ill for a while. he was very ill. I really I, I respect, highly respect Thich Nhat Hanh, Buddhist monk. Thich Nhat Hanh. who, has founded many Buddhist monasteries, and, who's a believer in social change, and of course in Buddhism. And I find that to be very inspiring, He believes in nonviolence, he believes in peace, and he has this, this walk where he takes people go with him and they walk one step at a time. Very gently, very mindful of everything, the leaves, the movement of your body, the steps, the weight on the ground itself. The wind, the sky, it all, is right there, as you said, one, two, one, two. I really want that in my life and I want that in everybody's life. To not be outside of ourselves, going somewhere else and never being in the present moment. writing that poem is, is sketchier for me because I write all these poems in a very quick fashion. Some I have more materials to play with. and this one was just, just a, a moment, I noticed he was feeling ill at that time, and I wrote it quickly for him. An offering poem, a blessing poem. And I like to write blessing poems. People have been asking me, you write about this massacre and you write about that killing and you write about San Bernardino and, what's going on? Is that all you do? But that's a good thing to do. and, my mother always blessed me, every day, like a thousand times, I think. She had a PhD in blessing others, and saving birds. She had an MFA in saving birds, and a PhD in blessing people. And that's why I'm here in a sense, because of all those blessings, all that beautiful, giving that she provided for me. So I provide it for others as much as I can, and I write these poems. Another thing about Thich Nhat Hanh is when he was in exile, he didn't have anyone. And, and he says, I, he says, I made a community with the grasses, I made a community with the birds, and I had made community with, trees, the sky. Yeah. And I wasn't alone then, but I thought I was alone there for a bit, but once I noticed that this was my community, I was no longer at home, that last home I had, this is my new home. Yeah. And that helped me a lot when I was in Redlands, California, working at UC Riverside. And, my family was in Fresno, and there where I was in Redlands, one stone's throw from Mentone, one stone's throw from the mountains, two stones from the mountains, right in front of me, and the trees, and the hawks, and this dry desert, and this big sky and the clouds. after reading ThinkND, I said, this is my community now. I would greet the hawk in the morning, and I would greet the mountains in the morning, and I would greet the clouds. And then I would discover that clouds like to hang out with mountains, and they like to be on top of the mountains. And then I said, Oh, those are, cloud hats. The mountains wear cloud hats. So then I got into cloud hats. And all this kind of came from, reading Thich Nhat Hanh, and, he always talks about performing your genuine self. He says, Thich Nhat Hanh. That's what we have to do. Think about that, it says, Perform your genuine self. And I like that. Because I like performance. And I like the notion of being genuine. And I like the notion of performing my genuine self. It's hard to do that. So many pressures on us. but I wrote this quick. And I must have written it on, on the journal. yeah, and that other poem, Notes on the Assemblage, it's a, it's a set of directions on how to, how to, do stuff. It says, I'll just read you the first stanza. It says, Notes on the Assemblage. Use black and gray and speckled white construction paper. Used stripped, scraped, and perforated construction paper. Used found paper, used cardboard, wet, and mashed. And then it continues. And those were actually initial instructions for me, in my journal, to create an art piece. I wanted to use those materials. It wasn't a poem. But then, I liked it, so then I extended it. And it became this thing called a poem. Yeah. Or what we call a poem. so those are two kind of ways of getting at poetry that I like. Sometimes I just find some of the, some stuff I've been writing, and I didn't consider it poetry, it was like a letter or a fragment, or an instruction on how to do a project that I wanted to make sure I had the ideas down before I forgot. Yeah. And then I said, wait a minute, I like that. It's a poem now. Hey, by the way, you're a poem now. And then I added a few lines. Yeah, it's funny that you say, Oh, I've never read this poem, but in hearing it, it feels like you've read it a million times. And I think it goes back to you being your genuine self because of that, it feels like the poem is a hundred years old, right? the timing and the themes and the way you read it with breath, it was beautiful. And so thank you very much for doing that. I have two more questions for you. Plotus. Plotus. Okay. Plotus. Let's talk about this title a little bit. you are the nation's first Latino Poet Laureate. Can you go through the day of when you were first notified that you were chosen to be the Poet Laureate of the United States? And also, how was it to meet the President of the United States? President Barack Obama, and how has that shifted you as a person and artist? Oh, those are three great questions, geez. I don't know. We have time? What was the last piece? How has it affected me? Yeah, how's it shifted you? Shifted me, yeah. A lot of shifting goes on. and that's the biggest, one of the biggest questions. I was at the University of Washington in Seattle teaching American Ethnic Studies. I had retired from UC Riverside. And a good friend of mine, Lauro Flores, who was the chair of that department at that time, spring of, spring of, This is incredible. Spring of last year. I can't believe it's been 40 years, but it's only actually been like a year. A one year. It feels like 40 years. So I was there, he says, Juan Felipe, would you like to teach a couple of classes? I go, definitely, for sure, I'll be off that. I'm retiring. so then I went ahead and did that, and there I was, and, he was very generous, Lauda Flores, a good friend, and, he, who also talks about literature, and who I also listen to in the right notes. so that's where I was, and I know Rob Casper, I had known Rob, I had met Rob Casper, who's a director of the, Literature and Poetry Center at the Library of Congress, that's in charge of the Poet Laureate. process. He's not, doesn't make any decisions, but he's part of that. I report to him and that's what I mean. I kind of report to him and I tell him the kind of projects I'm into and I want to do, because this is, the poet laureate position of the US, has the entire Library of Congress to, as a support system. So if I say I want some books on, Aztec, Mesoamerican codices, oh, here is one, original. they'll go pick one up. There's a couple there, and they put them on the table, and I get to look at them and, work with them, or the, Don Quixote first book of, Cervantes, here it is, the original, one of the originals, right here, then I get to look at them, which is very generous of the library. Rob Castro. I had met in LA at, po. out, PO out loud poetry series that Louise Steinman runs at the main library in Los Angeles. So she invited me and at that time, Rob Castro was director of the, I believe, of the, poetry Society of America. I hope I got that So he was in charge of many projects throughout the United States. See how they're running. and making sure that they needed anything else. so he came to L. A. that time to just look at that Outloud series and so we met and we got, lost in town, not far from the library, looking for something to eat. Oh, there's nothing to eat here, Rob, let's turn back. And we found a little, tavern that, had, grilled cheese sandwiches. This is a long story, I'm going to get right to it. And we ordered some grilled cheese sandwiches. And they were this big. They were as big as pancakes. They were as big as pizzas. They were as big as pizzas. Grilled cheese sandwich that big. Looked like a pillow. Or a face warmer or something. And, I said, look at this, Rob. So we goofed around about grilled cheese sandwiches. We made a lot of jokes about grilled cheese sandwiches. So time passes. I'm at the University of Washington in Seattle. And he says, Oh, by the way, he calls me up. Hey Juan, how you doing? I said, Oh, I'm doing great. Hey, so have you had any grilled cheese sandwiches? Oh, no, I'm really fine. How about you? I'm excellent. By the way, can you be by your phone in a couple of weeks on this date in, I believe it was, I believe it was May. I hope I'm right. Oh, yeah, sure. I'll be on the phone, I'll get you, I'll call you, at around one o'clock. I said, okay. All right, Ralph. Will do. Thank you. Bye. Catch you later. I said, why on earth do I have to make an appointment to talk with him two weeks later if I simply have no idea? So the phone rings two weeks later. I'm in the, in my office at the, American Ethics Studies. Phone rings. I pick up the phone and go, Hey, I got some grilled cheese sandwiches right here. I'm gonna send them to you in a flatbed truck. excuse me, sir. this is Dr. James Billington's office, head librarian of the Library of Congress. And who will talk with you right now? That was my, that was how I started my conversation. So Dr. James Billington says, Hello, Mr. Herrera. I'm so glad to, to have a talk with you. this is Dr. James Billington and we've been talking about your poetry, very excited about what you've been doing. As a matter of fact, it was a longer conversation. As a matter of fact, would you be willing to, serve as a United States poet laureate? I go, Oh. I go, yes, Dr. Billington. Thank you. Of course. Thank you. Thank you. I was thinking about the grilled cheese sandwiches. And then I said, I blew it. Yeah, but I said, Yes. He says, do you have any questions, Juan Felipe? I go, Oh, no, Dr. Billington. Everything's just fine. Excellent. so much. I really appreciate it. It's a true honor for me, which it is. Okay, that's it for now, and I'm so glad that you accepted this position, and we'll talk very soon. very honored to have you on board as a poet laureate of the United States. So thank you, Dr. Belyate. Hung up the phone. So that was the call, and Rob Casper, with good intentions of course, had me all set up. With, receiving the call, he didn't tell me what it was about. He couldn't, it was confidential. So that's how it began. And then I, school was over pretty soon, went home. I had four days of retirement. And on the 10th of, on the 10th of June, I had cameras, TV stations, Telemundo, you name it, Univision, outside my house in a big line. And calls, it was, the phone was going, doot. call and call. so that's how it began. And the second part of the question was of, President Obama. I, the James, Dr. James Billington is the head of the library. So he's the one who I, who, elects that I become the Poet Laureate of the United States. President Obama's part of it, of course. but he's a busy man. So all I see about, of the White House is through my window, my office window, which I have up there. And it's right across the street from where I'm at, but, I've had a chance to see him, Vice President, Joe Biden did invite me to a social, but I was doing other things at the library, so there was no way I could come see him, but I really appreciated the invitation, and hopefully I'll get to see, President Obama, that'd be great, and, beyond that, your third question? Actually, that was it, but we're going to end with one last question. Okay. And these are silly questions, right? Okay. I think it's fun. All right, get ready. So one, what is your favorite comida? This is a hard one because there's a lot. My favorite comida is enchiladas with rice and beans. All right, what color? Red with original chile from Hatch Valley in Old Mexico, cooked up by either, my sister Sara Chavez, or Margarita, back home, my partner. Yeah. they just cook up a storm. I give it a go, but I forget to put salt. Or, how do you throw it, throw the, throw the sauce on the grill, and then what, then you whip the tortilla, and you put it over here, put cheese, or you put it back in. I miss some steps here and there. But no matter what you put that sauce on, that enchilada sauce, homemade, from those chiles, kissed by the sun in Hatch Valley. You can put them on your shoes and eat your shoes. Put that sauce on your shoes and eat your shoes like Charlie Chaplin and chilada shoes That's your next poem and you're hungry. You have a head like mine just dip it in sauce Two yes, sir. What is your favorite color? Oh, my favorite color. Wow. I like turquoise a lot. I like, I like turquoise. I like the blue colors. Even though I keep on saying I like yellow and, crimson, Chinese red. And, I like, vanilla pink. I like to like vanilla pink. But I think it's going to have to be in the blues, especially the electric, bright royal electric blue, like neon blue, cerulean blue, crayon blue, cerulean blue. Oh, I love that. I'll kiss a car if it's cerulean blue. I'll kiss the car because I love that color. I'm going to paint myself blue next time I come. I love that color. I'll be here. And last question to close off the interview. If you could be an animal for one day, what would you be and why? What would I be? I don't think I'd be an ocean animal. I don't think I'd be a mountain animal. why? I love the elephant. The elephant is my brother and sister. Elephants, I love elephants. They're so strong and they're they're just so wise. Yeah. I think it would be a Bengal tiger. Why? Because, they, they're, they have the stripes of the universe on them. Why? I don't know. It's just, you look at a Bengal tiger's eyes, you better get a, you better step aside. Yeah. they can see and cheetahs can see. I just love it. My mother loved tigers. She had a whole That, those, those soft, veloury, sarapes with tigers on the wall. Yeah. Yeah. bedding on the couch. I guess that's why I'm mentioning the tiger. they're so beautiful. I guess because of the beauty. All animals are beautiful. A tiger, the elephant, horse, Yeah. even a cute, baby rooster or a cute little baby chick. Poyito. Poyito. Poyito. Poyito. And, hawks are beautiful. Hawks. You ever seen a hawk face to face? I have not. Oh. Oh. They're looking at you right through you. And the whole cosmos is looking because they're pure. It's a pure gaze. Animals have pure gazes. And I love them all. And with the stripes of the universe, we wrap up this interview with Juan Felipe Herrera. Thank you very much for joining us. And, we are very honored that you, have come to the University of Notre Dame. Thank you very much. so much. Thank you. Muchas gracias. Yeah. We'll have some enchiladas. Let's go have some enchiladas.