Word Simple

by Harold J. Recinos

Overview

Recinos discovered a love for poetry after being abandoned by Latino immigrant parents and living on the streets dealing with drugs, poverty, violence, racial discrimination, and existential desolation. After several homeless years, he was taken into the family of a white Presbyterian minister and guided back to school. Later, attending graduate school in New York City, Recinos befriended Nuyorican poets the late Miguel Pinero and Pedro Pietri who encouraged him to write and read poetry at the Nuyorican poets cafe. Word Simple is a collection of poetry that raises questions about how society is constructed from the context of people who are routinely silenced by history. Recinos' poems describe the realities of faith, love, struggle, migration, refugee flight, urban depravity, the politics of hate, and the fierce anger of the indignity of a life of marginality in society. His poetry not only expresses outrage and despair in the face of unjust suffering in the world, but he projects the struggles and beauty of invisible people who tilt always toward recognition. By his choice of subjects in his poetry, Recinos provides readers with sensitive and ethical resources to show the horror and joys of life. Graffiti on a page!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781498245746
Publisher:	Resource Publications
Publication date:	07/14/2017
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	154
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Harold J. Recinos is professor of Church and Society at the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University. Among recent publications are Wading Through Many Voices: Toward a Theology of Public Conversation (Roman and Littlefield, 2011) and Other Seasons (Wipf and Stock, 2017), among other works. In 1993, Recinos completed the Doctor of Philosophy with honors in cultural anthropology at the American University in Washington, DC.

Harold J. Recinos is professor of church and society at the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University. Among his publications are Good News from the Barrio: Prophetic Witness for the Church (2006), Wading through Many Voices: Toward a Theology of Public Conversation (editor, 2011), Where the Sidewalks Meet (2022), The Days You Bring (2022) and The Looking Glass: Far and Near (2023). He completed his PhD with honors in cultural anthropology in 1993 from the American University in Washington, DC. Since the mid-1980s, Recinos has worked with the Salvadoran refugee community and with marginal communities in El Salvador on issues of human rights.

Table of Contents

Look 1

Shout 2

Apologize 3

Other Shores 4

Say 5

The Place 6

Night 7

Old Revolutionaries 8

The Walk 10

The Shadows 11

Redemption 12

Salsa Night 13

The Future 14

Passages 15

Unshaken 16

Cold Day 17

Believe 18

The Wall 19

Been Gone 20

Follow Me 22

Rising Up 24

The Stripper 25

Charmed 26

The Apartment Visit 27

The Girl 29

I, Believe 30

Rock Bread 31

Becoming 32

Stand Up 33

Silence 34

The Move 35

Presidential Debate 37

The Hallway 38

Face Paint 40

The Playground 41

The Workers 42

Trying Times 43

Leaked 44

Panchimalco 45

Subway 46

The Box 47

First Prayer 48

The Wait 49

Trump Up 51

The Knot 52

Laurence 53

The Vision 54

Struggle 56

The Garden 57

The Nameless 58

Starry Night 59

Halloween Night 60

Stick Ball 61

There is Time 62

Tenderness 63

Wonder 64

Election Day 65

The Poor 66

The Day After 67

The Stone 68

Kindness 69

Evening Prayer 70

Election Day 71

Imagine 72

Letter to my Brother 74

Poverty 76

The Birth 77

Thanksgiving Day 78

Got It 80

Hudson Hotel 82

Wings 84

Fordham Road 85

Old Church 86

Answer 87

Waiting 88

Bend 89

The Pier 90

Ponder 91

El Barrio 92

Simple 93

The Big Tree 95

Here 96

Christmas, Rockefeller Center 97

Redemption 99

Piety 100

The Musician 101

Peace 102

The Drop 103

The Guitar 104

False Arrest 105

The Mother 107

New Year 108

After School 109

Where 110

Cold 111

¡Ay, Bendito! 112

Lost Day 113

Rain 114

Flight 115

The Climb 117

Sound 118

The Way 119

The Stand 120

Knock 121

Hunts Point 122

Exit 123

Lament 124

Awake 125

This time 126

Lent 127

Roadside 128

Beloved Community 129

What Matters 130

Bread 131

Simple Wood 132

Fish Platter 133

The Other Side 135

Pouring Rain 137

The Boys 138

The Stoop 139

Say! 140

Graduation 141

Clothesline 142

Bus Ride 143

Mr. President 145

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“Harold Recinos is a poet of witness and great humanity. His words are weighty and his poetry is carefully crafted into song. There’s a healthy combination of Whitman and Pietri in his voice. His work resonates with the kind of power and beauty that will change your life.”

—Virgil Suarez, author of 90 Miles: Selected and New Poems



“A poetry of such street-vision, precise lament, and gritty honor you’d think the ethics would burden the music, sinking it with the ‘drowned voices.’ But no—Recinos’ ‘clouds crowning school children’s heads,’ his ‘stirs of sweet life,’ throb and pulse with the dark beauty of a yet possible life.”

—Catherine Keller, author of Cloud of the Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement



“With surgical precision, Recinos singles out just the right word and image that drop us deep into the pains, sorrows, and joys of what it means to be Latinx in the United States today. With the concision of poetic form, Recinos weaves together the many voices that make up the tapestry of nuestra América: our tíos and tías, our mamás and papas, bricklayers, janitors, and those with bloodied feet forced to cross borders with the promise of surviving another.”

—Frederick Luis Aldama, author of Long Stories Cut Short: Fictions from the Borderlands

Editorial Reviews

Harold Recinos is a poet of witness and great humanity. His words are weighty and his poetry is carefully crafted into song. There’s a healthy combination of Whitman and Pietri in his voice. His work resonates with the kind of power and beauty that will change your life.”

—Virgil Suarez, author of 90 Miles: Selected and New Poems



“A poetry of such street-vision, precise lament, and gritty honor you’d think the ethics would burden the music, sinking it with the ‘drowned voices.’ But no—Recinos’ ‘clouds crowning school children’s heads,’ his ‘stirs of sweet life,’ throb and pulse with the dark beauty of a yet possible life.”

—Catherine Keller, author of Cloud of the Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement



“With surgical precision, Recinos singles out just the right word and image that drop us deep into the pains, sorrows, and joys of what it means to be Latinx in the United States today. With the concision of poetic form, Recinos weaves together the many voices that make up the tapestry of nuestra América: our tíos and tías, our mamás and papas, bricklayers, janitors, and those with bloodied feet forced to cross borders with the promise of surviving another.”

—Frederick Luis Aldama, author of Long Stories Cut Short: Fictions from the Borderlands

From the Publisher