Sheryl Luna

Sheryl Luna is a famous Latino poetry writer, for her book, Pity the Drowned Horses. She was born and raised in El Paso, Texas.  After high school she went and attended Texas Tech where she earned her BA.  She then went and attended Texas Woman’s University and earned her MA in English. Then continued and got her PhD in Contemporary Literature from the University of North Texas. In 2004 is when she published her book of poetry called, Pity the Drowned Horses.  It was published by the University of Notre Dame Press. Her book went to win the first Andres Montoya Poetry Prize.  The award was sponsored by the Institute of Latino Studies and the creative writing program from the University of Notre Dame. It also went to be one of the finalists in the National Poetry Series and the 2006 Colorado Book Awards. The final judge of the Andres Montoya Award, Robert Vasquez, commented this about her book of poetry, “her syntax—sometimes raw and edgy—creates a tableau where everything rushes toward ‘our wild need, all sweat, all shiver. The overall effect is simply mesmerizing.’”

Luna’s poetry discusses tends to discuss cultural identity and barriers between the U.S. and Mexican border.  This reflects where she grew up living in El Paso right on the Mexican American border.  However, her poetry in the book, The Wind Shifts, did not share the same themes. The three poems that had an impact on me were Her Back, My Bridge, Slow Dancing with Frank Perez, and The Colt. All three shared the sense of a story and all discussing a daily life of a Latino as well as showing the common theme of identity. Themes ranged from age to rape and from love to the scene of the city. Her writing style with these poems in the book goes through life and what we experience in life. She also shows how Latino experiences life and certain things that they deal with.

Her Back, My Bridge begins with a young girl describing her features and outfit. It shows what young Latinos were into and enjoyed doing in the area. As the poem continues it shows the girl aging. It begins describing the frailness of the women and the horrible features that comes with age. It shows us how once we are nearing our time, what becomes important to us. As a child she wished to receive jewels from GI’s wanting to get older and grow up and get married. The old lady has her mirror covered in pictures of herself as a child. All she can think about is she wished she could go back, be young again. It shows how as child we wish to age fast and grow up, but when we are old we just want to be young. This poem caught my attention because of the close details and the clever writing abilities of Luna. One of my favorite lines was when she is describing the old lady, “she’s breathing thin now, her veins too think, her bones to hollow.” She is able to put a vivid picture in my mind while making it flow beautiful throughout.

The second one if found to be wonderfully done was Slow Dancing with Frank Perez. In this poem she goes back to discussing the life of a young female. The girl begins by talking about a man and how he kisses like a fish. She goes into detail to describe himself into detail and the detail of the way he kisses. Unfortunately he dies in a parachute accident.  He will never get the chance to grow old. One of my favorite lines in the poem goes like, “memory does this, help us live.” Just like in her first poem she discusses the important to life and what is important to us as time changes. Memories and images change with age and we hold on to the memories that we hold dear. I believe n the poem she compares life to slow dancing. While we are living in the day it seem to last a life time, but when we look back, it seems as if it has passed by in a second.

The Colt, was the third poem I choose from Sheryl Luna. This poem was different then to two other ones I chose.  This one described nature and the colors of nature. It also describes a colt and the belly and hair of the colt. The reason I enjoyed this poem so much is the detail Luna puts in to describing the scene.  She describes the spotted mare, the dogs running, and the barren field. She writes about the call of hungry and the child that stood like God. Her flow and use of words is what caught me. Describing to the “T” what is happening. We can easily imagine our self there because of all the details. Here I believe she is describing her Latino home in El Paso in this poem. She is describing her home to use. I appreciate Sheryl Luna style and themes she uses throughout her writing. She shares with us such visual messages of her home and the Latino community.