The Poet X
by Elizabeth Acevedo (Author)
Booktalk: Xiomara Batista feels unheard and unable to hide in her Harlem neighborhood. Ever since her body grew into curves, she has learned to let her fists and her fierceness do the talking. But Xiomara has plenty she wants to say, and she pours all her frustration and passion onto the pages of a leather notebook, reciting the words to herself like prayers–especially after she catches feelings for a boy in her bio class named Aman, who her family can never know about. With Mami’s determination to force her daughter to obey the laws of the church, Xiomara understands that her thoughts are best kept to herself. When she is invited to join her school’s slam poetry club, she knows that she could never get around Mami’s rules to attend, much less speak her words out loud. But still, she can’t stop thinking about performing her poems. Because in the face of a world that may not want to hear her, Xiomara refuses to be silent.
Snippet:
ABOUT A
Every time I think about Aman
poems build inside me
like I’ve been gifted a box of metaphor Legos
that I stack and stack and stack.
I keep waiting for someone to come knock them over.
But no one at home cares about my scribbling.
Watch the poet perform “Music for A”.
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Copyright © 2018 Anastasia Suen All Rights Reserved.
POET X~~Spot on review. One reads this verse novel and one experiences the depth of the poet’s pain and the redemption promised in the art of reaching out via performance. Cherished. Verse. Novel.