Elodia Esperanza Benitez

Poetry in Motion: Love in Many Faces

An avid childhood reader, Elodia Benitez aspired to one day write a book of her own. Inspired by the books she read, Elodia felt like she could write stories just like the ones in her books. Fast forward to the present, it’s safe to say that Elodia—after publishing her first book of poems—has come a long way.

Elodia started writing her own stories at the age of 10. “It started off with me writing little tidbits,” she says, “but when my writing style started to develop, I found that what I really enjoyed doing was writing these little descriptive pieces.” After years of writing small stories, Elodia started pursuing poetry. Exposure to other forms of writing helped her find her own style, which allows her to tell stories in a way that is true to herself. “I really gravitate towards poetry that has a narrative,” she says. “I really gravitate towards making a picture, like a little scene. I like using different voices of people having a conversation within a poem.”

Many artists have been inspired by someone more famous, and Elodia doesn’t shy away from sharing who her inspirations are. Many of them are authors of classics she read in school: Maya Angelou, Robert Frost, and Sandra Cisneros. However, contemporary poets have also made their mark on her. “I’ve also gained inspiration through poets that I’ve gotten to meet and work with,” she says, “like Rosanna Alvarez who I’ve had the pleasure of knowing. She’s a poet out of San Jose. And also [Tshaka Campbell] the poet laureate out of Santa Clara County. I really like his work.”

When creating a poem, there are many thoughts and feelings that go into the process. For Elodia, this process starts with a phrase or a mental picture. An example she gives is the image of a group of girls walking the track in middle school. She describes, “You know, there’s always that little group in the back that doesn’t run—they walk and, like, chisme back there? I had that image in my head,

Love in Many Faces

I have known love

Wrapped warm

In the exhale of home

Love in Many Faces

Of worry to shake away

All consuming fear

Tethering bone deep

Love in ear-splitting fondness

Joy biting through fruit rind

Grief wails

Reverberating from the heart

The longing in a last embrace

Even still, I have known

The love of laughter at funerals

Esperanza, the steady neck

Holding up love

In Many Faces

Whispering

“Maybe, this time…” but I didn’t have the structure for a long time.” So she sits with it, letting the narrative develop through reflection and questioning. “I try to figure out what we’re talking about,” she says. “What’s going on? What’s happening?”

Her creative imagination also feeds her ambition. After years in the world of poetry, Elodia decided it was time to take it to the next level and selfpublish her poems as a book. “I had a picture in my head about this big chunky collection that’s about 80 poems strong,” she says. She imagined the poems as tied together with specific themes like coming of age, Mexican culture, and family.

Before that, though, she tried a smaller foray into selfpublishing. Elodia recalls, “I had a collection of poems that didn’t really fit into any collection that I was trying to put together. These poems were very love relationship based, and I tried to put them to the side. But they were kinda just there by themselves.” Eventually, she decided to just go for it and publish these 15 poems so she could get her feet wet and experience the process of selfpublishing. “It’s really special to me,” she says. “I designed the cover. I designed everything. I even formatted it myself. It’s very much a collection of love and a work of love.”

Now a published poet, Elodia sees this as only the beginning. She has plans for the future—not only for herself, but also for her community. This fall, she has a poetry collection coming out through Riot of Roses Publishing House. In general, she’ll be touring open mics in Santa Clara County and supporting other artists at cultural events. She also wants to start doing poetry workshops and creative writing events with kids and young adults in her hometown of Gilroy. “I think art is at its most beautiful when you’re using it to give back or make others grow,” she says. C