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4.16 AVERAGE
4.16 AVERAGE
An excellent, yet heart wrenching collection of poetry exploring Javier Zamora's journey to get to the US at only 9 years old. Provides an further exploration of the emotions and distress described by Zamora in his memoir, Solito.
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Second book of poetry I've read now, and I think I'm understanding how the poetic form is really effective in conveying trauma, and the process of recovering from trauma. In this collection, Zamora reflects and remembers his experience as a 9 year old making the journey, unaccompanied by family, from El Salvador to Mexico. His use of child perspective and bilingualism, reveals the conflict in crossing the border, and what it means for his identity. The border (a man-made construct) as a place of violence, and also of limbo, is something one cannot recover from - 'the war has never stopped', and so he dismisses the concept. Zamora's status of a refugee undoes his identity, and physically removes his sense of kinship, leaving an open wound that the hope of assimilation in the US does not heal.
emotional
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
emotional
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
A poetry collection following a young man trying again and again to fulfill his families dreams of coming to stay in America.
dark
emotional
sad
fast-paced
medium-paced
I need to know more about the history of El Salvador to better understand this collection, but I’m grateful to the student who recommended Javier Zamora to me. A complex text that deals with complex realities.