MFA Student Uses Poetry to Point the Finger at Politics

by Emma Epstein

When Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing student Mike Maggio’s eldest daughter was about two years old, he wrote a poem about her. Six years later, she was the proud hostess of a unique show and tell presentation, during which her father read the poem to her fourth grade class as part of a presentation on poetry.

But his daughter isn’t the only person that believes this writer has talent. In the past few years, Maggio has garnered the attention of publishers for both his fiction and his poetry. Recent publications include a collection of fiction entitled Sifting Through The Madness (Xlibris), a chapbook, Oranges From Palestine (Mardi Gras Press), and a collection of poetry, Your Secret Is Safe With Me (Black Bear Publications).

Maggio’s latest book deMOCKracy (Plain View Press, June 2007), a collection of poetry, focuses on what he perceives as Americans’ civil and political unrest with the policies of the Bush administration. “There is a lot of anger in the book, a lot of rage at what is going on,” Maggio wrote in an emailed statement. “I felt that I needed to express all of that because it is something that many people in the country are feeling…We are a broken country now, a country in pain.”

Along with the verbal imagery in the poetry, the verses feature visual cues, such as maps and wingdings. In his current compositions, Maggio is experimenting with the inclusion of technical language into his poetry, drawing upon experience in his job as an IT professional at the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

A native of New York City, Maggio moved to the Washington, D.C. metro area in 1993 from Saudi Arabia, where he met his wife. The couple now resides in Herndon with their three children.  Maggio graduated with a BA in English/Creative Writing from Queens College at the City University of New York and a MA in Linguistics from University of Southern California.  In 2003, he enrolled in Mason’s MFA program in Creative Writing.

The first inklings of deMOCKracy occurred when Maggio answered an open call for submissions from area poet/activist Sarah Browning to create an anthology by the D.C. chapter of the national Poets Against the War. After his submissions were published, Maggio became involved in the organization, coordinating groups of poets to participate in anti-war demonstrations. His work during such demonstrations was what eventually inspired Maggio to compose deMOCKracy.

Browning calls the book “exuberant, angry, full of compassion - a poetry for our beautiful, broken world” and Richard Peabody, editor of Gargoyle Magazine, writes that deMOCKracy is “required reading for those of us who ask ‘Is it Vietnam yet?’”

Maggio’s forthcoming book will incorporate his MFA thesis, which contains the compositions he has been working on for the past 3-and-a-half years during his academic career at Mason.

DeMOCKracy is available for purchase at Amazon.com and Plain View Press.

Maggio's personal website is www.mikemaggio.net.