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I Didn't Know There Were Latinos in Wisconsin: Three Decades of Hispanic Writing (third edition)
Edited by Oscar Mireles
Cover Art: Ben Seydewitz
ISBN 978-0-9846568-5-1
LCCN 2014947554
54 poems/17 prose pieces (both fiction and nonfiction)
Price: $20.00
Cowfeather Press
PO Box 620216
Middleton, WI 53562



About the Book:


Twenty-five years ago Oscar Mireles published the anthology, I Didn't Know There Were
in Wisconsin: 20 Hispanic Poets. This third volume in the series includes the work
of more than thirty authors of poetry, essay, memoir, and fiction and demonstrates once
again the breadth and depth of Latino/a writing and literature in Wisconsin. Not
strangers, not new arrivals, these authors represent an important part of the region's
cultural and social fabric. Written sometimes in English, sometimes in Spanish, and
sometimes in a dynamic mixture of both languages, Mireles' anthology helps to extend
many narratives: not only of what it means to be Latino/a in the Midwest, but also what
it means to be Midwestern.


About the Editor:


Oscar Mireles has published over 100 poems. He is the editor of two previous anthologies,
I Didn't Know There Were Latinos in Wisconsin: 20 Hispanic Poets (Focus Communications,1989)
and I Didn't Know There Were Latinos in Wisconsin: 30 Hispanic Writers (Focus Communications,
1999), and the author of Second Generation (Focus Communications, 1985). He is the father
of four children and worked as the Principal of Omega School, Madison, for over twenty years.
He also was a high school wrestling coach.





From the Anthology:


Brown Buffalo
by Rubén Medina

I couldn't give you Mexico City
With its sleepless flat roofs,
Its natural and social catastrophes,
Its streets full of anonymous stories
And knowledge one does not learn
At universities,
And its aggressive and affectionate greetings.

Instead, I brought you San Diego, Oaxaca,
San Francisco, Guanajuato, Madison,
Puerto Escondido, Tijuana, Minnesota
While I searched jobs in cities
That would never be like those
Of my childhood and adolescence.

You grew up on the highways,
Following a triangle that stubbornly
Connected California, the Midwest
And the Mexican tableland.
On the road you learned to read books,
Your hands stopped being clumsy,
You wrote your first poems,
And your eyes kept discovering
What was behind the mountains.

I couldn't give you Mexico City
But you intelligently chose another metropolis,
Another quicksand
In tune with your own pulse.
And there you are: Brown Buffalo
With New York City at your feet
Instead of over your shoulders.

I always assumed that at eighteen
Sons or daughters
Should leave the house and family.
With the passing of years I have changed
My mind.
Between freedom and selfishness
Life passes on.

I couldn't give you Mexico City.
You chose New York.



 

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