Patria Rivera: Outward and inward
Patria Rivera: Outward and inward
Poet Patty Rivera
By MARITES N. SISON
TheOrigami.ca
Laughter surprisingly comes easy for Patria “Patty” Rivera, the pre-eminent poet of Filipino descent in Canada, whose literary work do not exactly shy away from pathos, chaos, and the dark underbelly of life.
She laughs when asked about why she writes poetry, how she writes poetry, and whether she has written “the” poem.
Rivera, 69, isn’t one to take herself too seriously. As if to prove her point, she orders hot chocolate with whipped cream at Starbucks on College and Bay, where noticeably most are solemnly clutching an espresso.
Make no mistake, however. Rivera is dead serious and meticulous about her craft. Last spring, Winnipeg-based Signature Editions published her fourth book of poetry, The Time Between. Its synopsis, in part, reads: “In The Time Between, poems burrow deep inside rusty rooms, the brachiated hearts of sleepless women, the anguish pounding the fault lines of monsoons and long rains, the sheets of ancient wound and anger, the littered and abandoned alleyways of shell-shocked hamlets and towns.”
Covers of Rivera’s books of poems
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