Poetry / Edward Thomas-Herrera 

From the writer

:: Account ::

Ear­li­er this year, I was for­tu­nate enough to encounter a poem by William Ward But­ler enti­tled Dear I Can’t Believe It’s Not But­ter [Let­ter #2]. It’s a short, beau­ti­ful piece that starts off rather com­i­cal­ly (as the title would imply), before tran­si­tion­ing into some­thing much more pro­found. I loved it. As a result, I became intrigued by the idea of writ­ing a poem addressed to some­thing that wasn’t alive. Mem­o­ries start­ed flood­ing back about a ter­ri­ble French cof­fee press in our—well, just read the poem. It was nev­er my aim to get as dark as it did, but I’ve always believed that when you allow the words and images to tell you where they want to go, you should do every­thing you can to step out of their way. In the end, you’ll reach some­thing (hope­ful­ly) more mean­ing­ful. When dis­cussing this piece with friends, one of them wise­ly not­ed, “We inad­ver­tent­ly reveal so much about our­selves when writ­ing about inan­i­mate objects.”

Edward Thomas-Her­rera is a Sal­vado­ran-Amer­i­can poet, play­wright, and per­former liv­ing and work­ing in Chica­go, Illi­nois. He has a very long resumé of stage cred­its with which he refus­es to bore you, but he’s hap­py to tell you his poet­ry has appeared in Tofu Ink Arts Press and Beaver Magazine.