A Poetry of Remembrance

By Levi Romero
University of New Mexico Press, $19.95, 159 pages

Poetry is a hard thing to evaluate. There is no overarching narrative or characters to cling to, or judge. Only the author’s words, the attempt to evoke images and emotions in the reader. Levi Romero’s A Poetry of Remembrance does an admirable job of painting a vivid image of the Northern New Mexico he so clearly knows and loves. Its people, its culture, its poetry, even, are captured in the weaving of his words. Romero evokes: low-riders, Spanglish, blue-collar workers, low-income families, the broken-down America that is passed over by progress, and the ever-present yearning for something better and new, without having to give up our connections to the past, to a place that we know and are connected to, the places that accept us. Especially touching were “Diablitos” and “Yellow,” which draw you in to a world that, despite its foreignness, is beautiful and enchanting.

Reviewed by Jonathon Howard