LIMÓN, ADA
The speaker in this extraordinary collection finds herself multiply dislocated: from her childhood in California, from her familys roots in Mexico, from a dying parent, from her prior self. The world is always in motionboth toward and away from usand it is also full of risk: from sharks unexpectedly lurking beneath estuarial rivers to the dangers of New York City, where, as Limón reminds us, even rats find themselves trapped by the garbage cans theyve crawled into.
In such a world, how should one proceed? Throughout Sharks in the Rivers, Limón suggests that we must cleave to the world as it keep[s] opening before us, for, if we pay attention, we can be one with its complex, ephemeral, and beautiful strangeness. Loss is perpetual, and each persons mouth is the same / mouth as everyones, all trying to say the same thing. For Limón, its the sayingindividual and collective that transforms each of us into a wound overcome by wonder, that allows the wind itself to be our own wild whisper.
