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About the author
About the author
Eduardo R. del Río was born in Havana, Cuba and grew up in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He holds a Ph.D. in English Literature and is Emeritus Professor of Literature and Culture at the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley. He lives in the southern border town of Brownsville, TX with his wife Janet and cat Lucy.
He is an NEH Fellow, editor of The Prentice Hall Anthology of Latino Literature and One Island Many Voices: Interviews with Cuban-American Writers from The U of Arizona Press.
Сurrently:
He is working on a collection of slipstream short stories with Latinx themes titled “Latinx Futures.”
Books
Books
CubaRican
CubaRican
CUBARICAN is a bilingual sequence of vignettes and poems based on the author's experiences growing up in Puerto Rico as a Cuban exile. Describing both the Puerto Rican countryside and its urban grit, the maturing narrator eventually comes to grips with both sides of his Caribbean self.
The Prentice Hall Anthology of Latino Literature
The Prentice Hall Anthology of Latino Literature
This anthology exposes readers to a rapidly growing field of literary studies. This mainstream topic focuses on works and authors who have been forged by a dual consciousness. Topics covered include Cultural and Linguistic Considerations, Mexican-American Literature, Cuban-American Literature, and Puerto-Rican American Literature. For readers interested in learning about Latino Literature.
One Island, Many Voices: Conversations with Cuban-American Writers
One Island, Many Voices: Conversations with Cuban-American Writers
What del Rio has ultimately brought together is a series of intimate sketches that will not only serve as an important reference for any discussion of the literature but will also help readers to develop for themselves a sense of what Cuban-American writing is, and what it is not.
Short Stories
Short Stories
No Speaky Spanish
No Speaky Spanish
Set in the border town of Brownsville, Texas, the story presents one possible future if the "English only" movement is wholeheartedly embraced.
Redemption
Redemption
The story explores the dynamics of a tight-knit community and the challenges of acceptance and understanding within it, especially regarding differences in beliefs and behaviors.
The Lost Train
The Lost Train
John Santo boards a train with diverse passengers, witnessing mistreatment by guards and facing his own interrogation despite claiming U.S. citizenship, highlighting themes of immigration and discrimination.
Selected Poetry
Selected Poetry
Colonia by the Sea
Colonia by the Sea
(Appeared in Postcard Poems and Prose Magazine 2018)
___
Giggling in the dark.
Unable to contain the excitement of being home.
It was a long picking season.
Rumbling stomachs and chafed hands
Forgotten in the exchange of whispers
in the dark, dank room.
“They say there’s a great big lake close by.”
“Pero con sal1, they say.”
“It goes on forever.” “No. No puede ser.”
“Si, and if you can swim and swim you can go to a whole ‘nother place, they say.”
A place where everybody gets toys for Christmas.
And chocolate pudding for dessert.
1But with salt
2It can’t be
El Viejito
El Viejito
(appeared in The McKinley Review 2018)
___
The couch’s plastic cover roars with laughter
As the espresso’s sweet aroma fills the air.
The old man shuffles over the crusty linoleum.
The slapping of his rubber sandals seemingly in rhythm to the cafetera’s gurgle.
Three spoonfuls of sugar. Oh, how he likes his sweets, he thinks.
Like caña, like the sugar cane fields of his youth, he thinks.
Yes, she was sweet, barely sixteen, but with eyes that said she knew of things.
Not all things sweet.
El Paredón she knew about and saw; yes saw.
The man with the boina and the star.
The blood she saw. She knew. Yes. and she knew she had to leave.
The trunk of his car. And the shots. And the gate. And the faces of fear.
Ah, how sweet was youth and courage, he thinks.
Like his coffee. Yes, he likes it sweet, he thinks.
The steel-legged formica table merely yawns
As the old man bumps into it.
Mesquite Dreams
Mesquite Dreams
(appeared in The McKinley Review 2018)
___
The giant tree has stood its ground
Far longer than the rest.
She is impervious to the sirens
And the vatos walking by.
The concrete swells around her edges.
Tugs incessantly at her toes.
Demands that she relinquish her hold
on the decaying barrio.
Occasionally she dreams of times
when women with gnarled limbs
delicately plucked her ripened fruit.
When desperate fathers invoked her name
in a long forgotten tongue.
When time was marked
by the coyote’s lullaby
and the chachalaca’s morning cry.
When she could stretch in the morning sun
And hear gods whispering in her ears.
Óyeme
Óyeme
Appeared in Voices de La Luna, 216
___
For Pedro Pietri
Óyeme, I am here.
Im not in the bohío
Listening to the Cacique.
Im not in the coffee mill
Carrying loads for the master.
Im not on the front line
Taking bullets for the comandante.
Im not in the caserío
Running from la policía.
Im not in the barrio
Sweeping the stoop for the landlord.
Im not in the welfare line
Accepting condescencion from the caseworker.
Óyeme, I am here.
I’m not in the Olmec hut
Grinding maize for the high priest.
Im not in the mine
Digging gold for the soldado.
Im not on the front line
Taking bullets for the comandante.
Im not in the colonia
Running from la migra.
Im not in the projects
Hiding from la chota.
Im not in the free clinic
Accepting condescencion from the caseworker.
I am here…
I am in the classroom delivering a lecture.
I am in the boardroom conducting a meeting.
I am at the podium giving a speech.
I am at the hospital delivering a baby.
I am in the office drafting a law.
I am at home teaching my children.
.
Óyenos. We are here.
Los Morros
Los Morros
Appeared in The Journal Of Caribbean Literatures, 2012
See poem formatted for the page as intended here
See poem formatted for the page as intended here
___
Twins born from African Sweat and Blood.
Children for two hundred years.
Two hundred more as Adolescents.
Brothers in Arms standing Stout against foreign enemies.
Drake pounding on their sides to no avail.
Heads held high and Sight fixed on a Bright horizon.
Excited cries of children pierce the air Silence within its hungry entrails
As they fly kites on its broad shoulders. Rumbles for justice and demands revenge.
Whispers of lovers echo in its ears as they Forgotten moans of emaciated prisoners
Steal kisses in garitas that jut out to sea Echo through its collapsed lungs
Like bright unblinking eyes. Like dark coagulated blood.
Twins born from African Sweat and Blood.
Caribbean Menaechmi.
Torn apart by men who would be gods.
Doble Treinta
Doble Treinta
Appears in CubaRican
__
Doble Treinta
We played doble-treinta after school
hiding in dark places
where not even spiders would be found.
We were running kids,
Black, white and brown.
From taíno siboney and castellan.
Not afraid of the dark.
Not afraid of the echoes of long forgotten footsteps
that the nuns with wooden rulers left behind.
Not afraid of the junkies sleeping under newspapers
in the corner of the yard.
Not afraid of the sirens whizzing by
on their way to a caserío or a morgue.
Not afraid of stray dogs
wandering hungrily with vacant eyes.
Not afraid of long forgotten wars
that coursed throughout our veins.
Not afraid of each other‘s future rage.
Blessed by Fear
Blessed by Fear
Appeara in CubaRican
Blessed by Fear
Do I dare go into my parents’ room?
No expensive jewelry or precious vases.
No wallet full of cash.
No ghosts or boogeyman.
No rats or roaches or spiders.
No used condoms or pornography.
No leather strap or large-buckled belt.
No empty beer cans.
No needles or blackened spoons.
No adoption papers.
No faded photographs of past mistresses.
No letters from abroad.
No journal full of truths.
Soothing and serene.
A statue of a man on crutches.
The sweet smell of tobacco.
Multi-colored candles.
A half-empty glass of water.
A large beautiful doll in a corner.
Fruit. Pungent herbs.
Soothing and serene.
Do I dare go into my parents’ room?
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