Biography

Bio

Caridad McCormick is a 2007 recipient of a Florida Individual Artist Fellowship from the state of Florida Division of Cultural Affairs. She was a finalist for the Rita Dove Poetry Award in 2006 and 2008. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in journals such as The Sun, The Pedestal, Fifth Wednesday Journal, Crab Orchard Review, MiPOesias, The Seattle Review, CALYX, Slipstream, Spillway, Tigertail, A South Florida Poetry Annual IV, Her Mark 2009, Appleseeds, Or, How We Got Here, An Anthology of Americana Poems, Susan B. and Me, Just Like a Girl: A Manifesta and others. McCormick teaches English for Dade County Public Schools and is a Professor of English at Miami Dade College in Miami, FL.  She resides with her son and partner.  Her chapbook Visionware was released by Finishing Line Press (WWW.Finishinglinepress.com) in 2009.  She resides in Miami, FL.

Artist Statement

The first metaphor to ever wrap itself around my brain was the one about America being a melting pot.  I pictured a bubbling cauldron, a  distillation of flavors, the loss of texture, an offering that amounted to a one-taste-fits-all shade of gray, and I wanted nothing more than to melt into my place in that proverbial pot.  At home, however, my Mami's casuelas were filled with potaje -- chunky soups that were more stew than water, rich broths studded with onions and green peppers, chunks of chorizo and potato and beans, concoctions cooked long enough to soften, but not so much that the flavor of each separate ingredient was lost.  In this way, I began to realize that in order to find myself I did not need to melt down into some watered version of myself.  I didn't want to melt; I wanted to stay chunky, full of flavor. 

Today, my work as a Latina poet examines this very concept: The way identity is shaped via language and cultural expectations, how society shapes and often collides with the search for self in terms of navigating one's journey and finding one's place in a global community without losing the idiosyncrasies that makes one unique.  Further, my poetry seeks to explore the expectations placed upon women, with an emphasis on the experience of Cuban-American women, when it comes to moving beyond the domestic sphere and delving into experiences that may fall beyond the parameters of what it means to be a "good girl," a "good mother," a "good Cuban," a "good American," with regard to sexuality, academics, and/or the evolution of a woman's place in the public sphere.  In order to fuse what may appear to be two disparate cultures, I incorporate images and symbols that are steeped in both pop culture and Cuban folklore and traditions, thus challenging archetypal expectations by replacing them with modern day sensibilities that reflect the ever changing Cuban-American Diaspora that is so rich in Florida.

Praise for Visionware:

Visionware is a survival kit for any woman navigating theough the expectations of being a daughter, mistress, wirfe, or mother; for any woman questioning the superimposition of these roles, and trying to remake herself in the process. Caridad Moro-McCormick is both the expert guide and the guided on the journey toward her true womanhood. Rendered with the keeneset of images and told with a most courageous honesty, these poems remind us that what we too often misperceive as our failures, lead us in the end to a truer triumphant self.                               --Richard Blanco, author of City of a Hundred Fires and Directions to the Beach of the Dead

Caridad Moro-McCormick's Visionware explores a diverse, complex world with clear-eyed frankness, wry humor, and rich, intimate detail.  There are no fairy-tale endings here, only the powerful emotional truth from someone who's been there, struggling against conformity and discrimination.  She tells her tales with the hard-earned wisdom of survival. No one is going to put anything over on this fine, talented  poet.                                                                                             --Jim Daniels, author of Revolt of the Crash-Test Dummies and In Line for the Exterminator

Caridad Moro-McCormick knows how to tell a good story.  In Visionware, she uses crisp, succint narrative poetry as a vehicle to convey multifaceted relationships.  She writes with precision and heartbreak about her Cuban-American heritage, the sounds and smells of Miami, first love, real love, and loss. Caridad Moro-McCormick destabilizes what we know as familiar and reinvigorates nostalgia into something wholly and wonderfully new.                             --Denise Duhamel, author of Ka-Ching! and Two and Two.