Neither essays nor prose poems, the pieces in Empty Pool propose a new genre: the essay poem. Vivid and restless, Zapata's mind ranges through motherhood, octopi, the Covid pandemic, photography, extinction, dogs, translation, birds, memory, recipes, reading aloud, and people who live as if they are "contestants in a sinister gossiptransmission contest organized by some telecommunications company." Each of these haunting, ephemeral, fragmentary and of- ten funny works, beautifully brought into English by Robin Myers, offers a unique and piercing amalgam of the intellectual energy and engagement of the essay and the verbal agility, silence, and ambiguity of poetry. Esther Allen