New releases from Ibex Band, Lucy Dacus, and Various Artists
Letters from Latin America with Leo Boix: March 4, 2025
A pamphlet by British Latinx poet Patrick Romero McCafferty, poetry by Anglo-Argentinian Miguel Cullen, and a book of conjuring poems by Mexican Pedro Serrano
boix
IN glass knot sun (Ignition Press, £7) British Latinx poet and editor Patrick Romero McCafferty unveils a personal narrative that transports readers from Mexico to Scotland and back. The book explores the materiality of the land, soil and human labour with striking beauty and profound insight.
The pamphlet, featuring 18 powerful poems, begins with Espiritu Santo With Snorkeller ’17, a visual poem that depicts a landscape in Mexico with mountains, the sun, a tranquil sea, and undercurrents represented by moving symbols “>==o> >==o>”. There is something mysterious and suggestive about this poem, which precedes A Doorway Between Explosions, written by the author about the San Juanico Disaster in Mexico City in 1984.
Here, Romero McCafferty underscores the human suffering resulting from a tragedy that claimed more than 500 lives and left around 7,000 people severely burned:
More from this author
Travelogue/reportage by Argentinean Maria Sonia Cristoff, and poetry by Peruvian Gaston Fernandez and Puerto Rican Cristina Perez Diaz
LEO BOIX selects the best books of fiction, poetry, and non-fiction written by Latinx and Latin American authors published this year
Mexican Yuri Herrera’s novel about Benito Juarez in New Orleans, and poetry by Mexican Fabio Morabito and Argentine Sergio Chejfec
Femicide and the search for justice in Mexico: a book by Cristina Rivera Garza; and a travel book through Latin America by Welsh poet Richard Gwyn