"'Borderbus' takes place on a U.S. Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) bus. Two women, detained while trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border, are being transported to a detention center. They whisper in English and Spanish to avoid the attention of the guard. This USB drive contains two versions of the poem. The first is a reading in two voices by Marisol Baca and Gabriela D. Encinas, directed by Juan Felipe Herrera and recorded by Curtis Messer. The second is a recording of Herrera reading 'Borderbus.'"--Colophon.

"When Juan Felipe Herrera was very young, he picked flowers, helped his mama feed the chickens, slept under the starry sky, and learned to say goodbye to his amiguitos each time his migrant family moved on. When he grew up, Juan Felipe Herrera became a poet. His breathtaking poem "Imagine" and Lauren Castillo's evocative illustrations will speak to every reader and dreamer searching for this place in life."--Jacket.

A former United States Poet Laureate shares secrets about viewing the world from a poet's perspective, explaining how "jabberwalking" poets draw inspiration from everything they experience to express themselves in creative ways.

• It can begin with clouds
• Ayotzinapa:
• Ayotzinapa
• Ayotzinapa
• Y si el hombre con el choke-hold
• If the man with the choke-hold
• Almost livin' almost dyin
• View With No One:
• You & I belong in this kitchen
• Here and there
• Ourselves
• White dove-found outside Don Teriyaki's
• Notes on the assemblage
• On the verge of drowning
• You throw a stone
• Hard Hooks:
• Los Angeles barrio sonnet for Wanda Coleman
• Hard hooks that fold you down to your knees
• Bisbee Poetry Festival, Southern Arizona,
• 1985
• Hey Phil
• Oda para Jose Montoya
• Ode for Jose Montoya
• Lucid And Undecipherable Tasks:
• Lucid and undecipherable tasks
• Soldier in the empty room
• I Do Not Know What A Painting Does:
• Jackrabbits, green onions & witches stew
• Tasmano
• En la media medianoche
• In the mid of midnight
• Fulgencio salio de Oaxaca hacia El Norte
• Fulgencio left Oaxaca toward El Norte
• I do not know what a painting does
• Radiante (s)
• Borderbus:
• Tomorrow I leave to El Paso
• Borderbus
• Soap factory
• But I was the one that saw it (drone aftermath)
• Numbers, patterns, movements & being
• Untitled, unfettered-
• I am Kenji Goto
• Song out here
• We Are Remarkably Loud Not Masked:
• Thich Nhat Hanh I step with you
• We are remarkably loud not masked
• Half-Mexican
• Smiling dragon
• Saturday nite at the Buddhist Cinema
• Poem By Poem:
• Poema por poema
• Poem by poem
• Gracias
• Acknowledgments
• About the author.

Juan Felipe Herrera, the first Latino Poet Laureate of the United States and son of Mexican immigrants, grew up in the migrant fields of California. Exuberant and socially engaged, reflective and healing, this collection of new work from the nation's first Latino Poet Laureate is brimming with the wide-open vision and hard-won wisdom of a poet whose life and creative arc have spanned chasms of culture in an endless crossing, dreaming and back again. "Juan Felipe Herrera's family has gone from migrant worker to poet laureate of the United States in one generation. One generation. I am an adamant objector to the Horatio Alger myth of pulling oneself up by the bootstraps, but Herrera's story is one of epic American proportions. The heads carved into my own Mount Rushmas would be Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta, Frida Kahlo, El Chapulin Colorado, Selena, and Juan Felipe Herrera. Notes from the Assemblage further carves out Herrera's place in American letters." --David Tomas Martinez "At home with field workers, wage slaves, the homeless, little children, old folks, artists, traditionalists, the avant-garde, students, scholars and prisoners, the bilingual Juan Felipe Herrera is the real thing: a populist treasure. He will fulfill his appointment as U.S. Poet Laureate with the same high energy, savvy, passion, compassion, commitment and playfulness that his art and life's have always embodied. Bravo! Bravo!"--Al Young "While reporters can give you the what, when, and where of a war, a poet with the enormous gifts of Juan Herrera can give you its soul."--Ishmael Reed "I am proud that Juan Felipe Herrera has been appointed U.S. Poet Laureate, bringing his truthful, beautiful voice to all of us universally. As the first Chicano Laureate, he will empower all diverse cultures."--Janice Mirikitani "Herrera is ...a sometimes hermetic, wildly inventive, always unpredictable poet, whose work commands attention for its style alone ...Many poets since the 1960s have dreamed of a new hybrid art, part oral, part written, part English, part something else: an art grounded in ethnic identity, fueled by collective pride, yet irreducibly individual too. Many poets have tried to create such an art: Herrera is one of the first to succeed."--The New York Times "Herrera has the unusual capacity to write convincing political poems that are as personally felt as poems can be."--National Public Radio.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Bernardo de Gálvez
• David Glasgow Farragut
• Adelina Otero-Warren
• Ignacio E. Lozano
• Dennis "Dionisio" Chavez
• Luis W. Alvarez
• Julia de Burgos
• Desi Arnaz
• César Estrada Chávez
• Helen Rodriguez-Trias
• Dolores Huerra
• Jaime Alfonso Escalante
• Rita Moreno
• Roberto Clemente
• Tomás Rivera
• Joan Baez
• Judith F. Baca
• Sonia Sotomayor
• Ellen Ochoa
• Hero Street U.S.A.
• Sestina for Victoria Leigh Soto.

"An inspiring tribute to Hispanic Americans who have made a positive impact on the world. This visually stunning book showcases twenty Hispanic and Latino American men and women who have made outstanding contributions to the arts, politics, science, humanitarianism, and athletics. Gorgeous portraits complement sparkling biographies of Cesar Chavez, Sonia Sotomayor, Ellen Ochoa, Roberto Clemente, and many more. Complete with timelines and famous quotes, this tome is a magnificent homage to those who have shaped our nation. In this volume: Adelina Otero-Warren, Bernardo de Galvez, Cesar Chavez, David Farragut, Dennis Chavez, Desi Arnaz, Dolores Huerta, Ellen Ochoa, Helen Rodriguez Trias, Hero Street USA, Ignacio Lozano, Jaime Escalante, Joan Baez, Judy Baca, Julia de Burgos, Luis Alvarez, Rita Moreno, Roberte Clemente, Sonia Sotomayor, and Tomas Rivera"-- Provided by publisher.
"Twenty Hispanic American artists, scientists, athletes, activists and political leaders are profiled in this stunning picture book, complete with inspirational quotes and distinctive expressionist portraits"-- Provided by publisher.

Juan Felipe Herrera is at his best in his first original collection in several years. In Senegal Taxi, Herrera brings attention to global oppression and injustice through poems that address genocide and hope in Africa.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

For nearly four decades, Juan Felipe Herrera has documented his experience as a Chicano in the United States and Latin America through stunning, memorable poetry that is both personal and universal in its impact, themes, and approach. Often political, never fainthearted, his career has been marked by tremendous virtuosity and a unique sensibility for uncovering the unknown and the unexpected. Through a variety of stages and transformations, Herrera has evolved more than almost any other Chicano poet, always re-inventing himself into a more mature and seasoned voice. Now, in this unprecedented collection, we encounter the trajectory of this highly innovative and original writer, bringing the full scope of his singular vision into view. Beginning with early material from A Certain Man and moving through thirteen of his collections into new, previously unpublished work, this assemblage also includes an audio CD of the author reading twenty-four selected poems aloud. Serious scholars and readers alike will now have available to them a representative set of glimpses into his production as well as his origins and personal development. The ultimate value of bringing together such a collection, however, is that it will allow us to better understand and appreciate the complexity of what this major American poet is all about.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Yolanda, a Puerto Rican girl, tries to come to terms with her painful past as she waits to see if her uncle recovers from injuries he suffered when the towers collapsed on September 11, 2001.

From June of 1958 to June of 1959, Juanito tries to stay out of mischief and be good as he, his mother, and his father move around the state of California, never quite feeling at home.

Although Tomasito's spina bifida keeps him in a wheelchair, where he often feels as confined as his flightless and featherless pet bird, he discovers that he can feel free when he is on the soccer field.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Eight-year-old Esmeralda is transformed into a superhero and flies off to rescue her mother, who visited Mexico without her green-card and is not being permitted to return to the United States.

Juanito accompanies his grandmother to a flea market in southern California, where he helps her and the other vendors and where they enjoy seeing old friends from their Mexican-American community.

• Your throat burns, Red
• Bull and octopus = Pulpo y toro (Adiós, querido PRI)
• Ofelia
• Giraffe on fire
• Beneath your skin = Bajo tu piel.

• Xunka: the lost daughter
• Pascuala: mother among thunder
• Maruch: grandmother of the roads
• Makal: daughter of the drums
• Xunka: la hija perdida
• Pascuala: la madre entre los rayos
• Maruch: la abuela de las veredas
• Makal: la hija de los tambores.

Juan Felipe Herrera's playful language and the colorful, magical art of Elizabeth Gomez capture the universal experience of entering a new school and feeling like a stranger in a world that seems upside down.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)