Rebozos of Love: Floricanto 1970-1974
Author: Juan Felipe Herrera
Publisher: Flowersong Press (2023)
In Rebozos there are celebrations, sweat lodges, songs calling out liberation, infinities of self & there is sweet corn, frijol, heart, naked earth & body, flaming waters, Quetzalcoatl, the speaking Quetzal, thorns, new words & shells, unfolding flowers, adobe, pueblos, venados, constellations, revelations of hemispheric unity, voice-stories from New Mexico, feathers & guitars, chakira, kupurisol — the essence of the sun. I enjoyed writing this book. I unshackled it, no titles, no page numbers. Sometimes I broke away from typical gendered terms in Spanish, I introduced Nahuatl deities and Huichol terms & there are drawings here & there, perhaps, like our Native weavings & yarn portals. Imagine yourself standing on a mountain at dawn, singing these poems from 1970 to 1974, at the crossroads of many social movements. At the beginning of a new wave of Latinx literature.