Poetry for Students

144 Poetry for Students

of formal structure, but her ear guided her in mat-

ters of rhyme and rhythm. After the sixth grade,

however, Cisneros stopped writing for a while. In

her junior year in high school she was exposed to

works by the finest of British and American writ-

ers and by Latin-American poets who impressed her

deeply. Finally, in her junior year at Loyola Uni-

versity, she was introduced to writers such as Don-

ald Justice, James Wright, and Mark Strand, poets

who had influenced a whole generation of Spanish

writers, thus bringing Cisneros into touch with her

cultural roots. She was also introduced to the

Chicago poetry scene, where there was great inter-

est in her work. She was encouraged to study in a

creative-writing program and was admitted to the

Iowa Writers’ Workshop; she had hoped to study

with Justice but discovered that he and Marvin Bell

were on sabbatical leaves that academic year.

Cisneros looks back on those years and admits

she did not know she was a Chicana writer at the

time, and if someone had labeled her thus, she

would have denied it. She did not see herself as dif-

ferent from the rest of the dominant culture. Her

identity was Mexican, or perhaps Puerto Rican, be-

cause of the neighborhood she grew up in, but she

mostly felt American—because all her reading was

of mainstream literature, and she always wrote in

English. Spanish was the private language of home,

and she spoke it only with her father. Cisneros

knew no Chicano writers in Chicago, and although

she was the only Hispanic majoring in English at

Loyola, she was unaware of being different—in

spite of her appearance, which was considered ex-

otic by her female classmates.

The two years at Iowa were influential on Cis-

neros’s life and writing. She admits that the expe-

rience was terribly cruel to her as well as to many

of the other first-year students, but it was also lib-

erating. She had her share and fill of intimidating

teachers and colleagues as well as some marvelous

ones who helped and encouraged her. This was a

time for Cisneros to mature emotionally, something

she had neglected to do for some years—always

having considered herself as somebody’s daughter,

lover, or friend. The poet struggled in these years

with finding a voice for her writings. She imitated

her teachers, her classmates, and what she calls the

“terrible East-coast pretentiousness” that perme-

ated the workshop, without finding satisfaction. An

important friend at this time was Joy Harjo, a Na-

tive American from Oklahoma, who was well cen-

tered in her southwestern heritage and identity and

who also felt lonely and displaced in the Iowa

workshop. This friendship offered Cisneros the as-

surance that she had something to write about that

would distinguish her from her classmates.

The bulk of Cisneros’s early writing emerged

in 1977 and 1978. She began writing a series of au-

tobiographical sketches influenced by Vladimir

Nabokov’s memoirs. She purposely delighted in be-

ing iconoclastic, in adopting themes, styles, and ver-

bal patterns directly opposed to those used by her

classmates.The House on Mango Streetwas born

this way, with a child’s narrative voice that was to

be Cisneros’s poetic persona for several years.

The poem “Roosevelt Road,” written in the

summer of 1977, is most important to Cisneros be-

cause it forced her to confront the poverty and em-

barrassment she had lived with all her previous

years and to admit the distinctiveness of this back-

ground as a positive resource that could nourish her

writing. In this poem the language is completely

straightforward and descriptive of the tenement

housing where the poet lived as a child. Lines run

into one another, so that the reader is compelled to

follow the inherent rhythm, while working on the

sense of the message:

We lived on the third floor always

because noise travelled down

The milkman climbed up tired everyday

with milk and eggs

and sometimes sour cream.

.......................

Mama said don’t play in alleys

because that’s where dogs get rabies and

bad girls babies

Drunks carried knives

but if you asked

they’d give you money.

....................

How one time we found that dollar

and a dead mouse in the stone wall

where the morning glories climbed....

Once Again I Prove the Theory of Relativity

Cisneros looks back

on those years and admits

she did not know she was a

Chicana writer at the time,

and if someone had labeled

her thus, she would have

denied it.”

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