BOOKS
COYOTE MASKS
WHERE HE’S CALLING FROM
CSU professor’s essay collection speaks from the ‘in-between’ space of mixed ethnicity BY BART SCHANEMAN
Y
ou can tell a lot about a person from the way they say the word “coyote.” The conventional wisdom is that people west of the Mississippi River say it kai-ote, without the ee sound at the end made popular by Road Runner’s nemesis Wile E. Coyote and common throughout the rest of the country. There’s also a third pronunciation, koy-yo-tae, and that’s how author Harrison Candelaria Fletcher says it. The writer adopts the persona of the coyote, also New Mexican slang for “mixed,” in his book Finding Querencia: Essays from In-Between, which was a finalist for the Colorado Book Award in the Creative Nonfiction category this year. Fletcher, who teaches creative nonfiction in the English Department at Colorado State University, says the meaning of the word has changed somewhat over the years. “When I was growing up in New Mexico, somebody they called a ‘mutt,’ or somebody who was of mixed ethnicity, was a ‘coyote,’” he says. “Now a coyote is predominantly known for the immigration connotations, as a trickster who ferries people across the border and often screws them over.” By using the older definition, Fletcher takes the power back from the derogatory term, wearing it like a veil that allows him to speak in a voice that transcends his own. “The coyote mask allowed me to see myself clearly,” he says. “It allowed me to see myself as if I’m on a screen and gave me a distance I never really had before. Using the slur and repurposing it was a way to actually talk about things I wasn’t able to talk about.” Throughout these essays, Fletcher speaks from the “in-between,” stylishly BOULDER WEEKLY
capturing the nuance of racial identity and life writ large. “We all inhabit liminal spaces in our lives,” he says. “None of us are one thing or another. It’s an attempt to embrace the multiplicity that we all are.” Fletcher has lived in Colorado since 1997, working as a journalist and teaching on the Front Range. Exploring in part how place affects persona, Finding Querencia is largely longing for safety and belonging. “That’s part of what I was trying to negotiate in this book — being from somewhere that you’re not living in,” he says. “New Mexico has had a huge influence on me, but I’m also a Coloradan, and I’ve probably lived here almost as long as I’ve lived in New Mexico. The struggle with the book is in finding a connection, finding one’s place where you belong. It’s something I’m still negotiating.”
Finding Querencia: Essays from In-Between was a finalist for the 2023 Colorado Book Award in the Creative Nonfiction category. Courtesy: The Ohio State University Press
A common rule in creative writing is to ask, “What’s the story that only I could write?” In penning Finding Querencia, Fletcher distilled his essence and viewpoint to explore the difference between writing about something and writing from something. “You want to write from your heart, from your core,” he says. “I’m writing to discover what I didn’t know that I knew. I’m writing to try to understand something.” In spite of the heavy themes, the book itself isn’t somber or overly contemplative. The structure is more experimental than the title Harrison Candelaria Fletcher teaches creative nonfiction in the describes, and many English Department at Colorado State University. Courtesy: Harrison of the pieces resemCandelaria Fletcher ble prose poetry as genre-bending book that’s classified as much as they do essays. Fletcher says fiction but is a memoir at heart. It he wanted the pieces to read like he weaves Kingston’s personal story with was reaching toward understanding. old Chinese folktales. “I’m not a poet, and I wasn’t trying to “Instead of trying to use a Western write poetry,” he says. “I just wanted to narrative to make sense of her world, see what would happen if I pushed she’s like, ‘Why? That’s not how I toward what I was trying to reach.” understand things,’” Fletcher says. In that push, the sentences gained “That book gave me the permission to intensity and often ended up somespeak the language I grew up with. It’s where much different than where they liberating when … there’s not a box you started, according to Fletcher. “That felt invigorating and also kind of fit in, to see people who are not even trying to fit in the box.” true,” he says. “It was the mask of the For his next book, Fletcher says he coyote and his intense reaching for is working on more essays wearing his something that led to the way the book coyote mask: “He still has things to was written. It wasn’t by design.” say.” To Fletcher, the book works best when it’s read aloud. “There’s a cadence and a rhythm and a delivery that may not come ON THE PAGE: Finding across on the page,” he says. “The Querencia: Essays from pieces are probably better understood if In-Between by Harrison they’re delivered. I don’t do the poet Candelaria Fletcher is out voice thing, but there’s a rhythm to it.” now in hardcover and paperAs for cultural influences and touchback via The Ohio State points, Fletcher cites Maxine Hong University Press. Kingston’s The Woman Warrior as a NOVEMBER 30, 2023
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