Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Editor’s Note

2019; Oxford University Press; Volume: 26; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1093/isle/isz080

1759-1090

Scott Slovic,

Latin American and Latino Studies

Sherwin Bitsui’s latest poetry collection, Dissolve, offers a vivid wander through the complexities of a desert romanticism. The opening poem “The Caravan” acts a frontispiece for the book-length poem “Dissolve” that follows. “The Caravan” centers on the murder of a young man outside of a bar called The Caravan. This poem is emblematic of the many American Indian lives that have succumbed to violence. It begins: “The city’s neon embers / stripe the asphalt’s blank page / where this story pens itself nightly” (4). Light and its absence play a significant role in how this image is presented, reflected, and moved. Water—an element with special significance to desert people—is important, too. The stanza continues: “Where ghosts weave their oily hair / into his belt of ice, / dress him in pleated shadows / and lay him fetal / on the icy concrete — / the afterbirth of sirens glistening over him” (4). Ice is the stillness of water—and here, the stillness of death.