☕︎ Migratory Poetics in Practice: Melanie Merle

Migratory Poetics in Practice is a sit-down questionnaire with contributors of ni’hikeyah tʼáá jííkʼe, all free nations, todas las naciones libres: migratory in verse.

In this intimate exploration of creative diaspora, I ask these artists and poets about their venture into the unknown, into the space of reimagining textual beginnings, and where they can end up. In this migration, these creatives offer practices we can take as artists in our own right, to give language the malleability it needs to express our more complex thoughts and feelings.

CH: First, I want to say these limericks remind me of Dorothy Parker, particularly in how they explore power dynamics through language. Through the limerick form specifically, you take on the social satire of what the Bush administration has evolved into over the years. Another thing to note is that limericks are often used in geography courses for children for memorization, such as your playful use of “Baghdad.” I want to ask, what led you to choose this form as a vehicle?

MM: I initially chose the limerick form, as I was inspired by the date of the speech and Bush's opening remarks honoring the contributions of Irish immigrants. Limericks as a form are often transgressive, and there's so much about this speech that rumbles with bravado and mis-placed aggression, as well as general BS.

Limericks were sometimes employed as a drinking game—a hurling of insults back and forth between drinking buddies, taking on an air of immature, collegiate humor—so these limericks, written from the POV of Bush himself, are meant to allude to both locker room and war room, to the saber rattling of the speech.

CH: The line “he made me super mad” echoes Virginia Woolf’s observation in A Room of One’s Own, that men are often furious with women, and women, in turn, are angry at men for being so angry with them. It’s fascinating how this shifts the focus of the limerick from the distant “man in Baghdad” to a more intimate perspective, where “me” and “I” exist alongside figures like Saddam.

The way male anger shapes and influences the Speaker’s voice is striking. Do you find that dynamic plays a role in the poems?

MM: War is an unnatural state, and to drive an entire country, even calling on "all free nations" to join in and prepare for war, is to set aside the cause of peace. Though the speech is meant to be a warning, it is only a trick and an illusion of power. In reality, Bush seeks only to justify the coming aggression, a surrender to our basest inclinations.

CH: How do you see the limerick functioning as a poetic strategy for evading or subverting the language of the original text? In particular, how does humor serve as a kind of migrational tool, one that allows you to move through and beyond dominant linguistic and cultural frameworks? So much of English metaphor remains untampered, designed to comfort or entertain a white reader. Does the limerick’s irreverence give you space to challenge that, to reshape the terms of address?

MM: You ask how humor can be a "migrational tool." I would suggest that, like the fable, "The Emperor Has No Clothes," the limericks serve to reveal the foolishness of political bluster. They subvert in that they could be a substitute for the speech in the way political cartoons lampoon public figures.

The use of obscenity—I find the twisted and manipulative behavior of most politicians to be rather obscene, as I find war-mongering to be thoroughly obscene. The mindless and heartless destruction of war is an obscenity, perpetrated by people who cannot rise to the challenge of peace-making. So, the use of limerick, simple and silly (as Edward Lear would name it–nonsense), embraces the self-mockery of such a man, driven by ego and fueled by lies and treachery.