Abuelito Who

Sandra Cisneros is an American writer of Mexican heritage and a key figure in the Chicana literary movement. She is best known for her 1983 novel The House on Mango Street. Cisneros’s work, reflecting her own childhood experiences, explores cultural hybridity and identity while navigating poverty, classism, and racism.

Her 1987 poem “Abuelito Who” typifies her style—characterized by simple language and syntax—and depicts the changing relationship between a grandfather (Abuelito) and his grandchild. Told from the grandchild’s point of view, “Abuelito Who” is a 23-line run-on sentence comprising a series of descriptions and associations about her grandparent, who is sick and possibly approaching death. However, one of the poem’s central tensions is the speaker’s childlike confusion around the circumstances surrounding her ailing Abuelito. The Spanish abuelito, and references to the Spanish language, highlight the cultural heritage of the speaker and her family, placing the poem within the canon of Chicana literature.

Poet Biography

Sandra Cisneros was born in Chicago in 1954. She grew up as the only girl in a lower-income family of six brothers. Her parents migrated routinely between the United States and Mexico, leaving Cisneros feeling as if she never truly belonged anywhere. This lack of belonging, or the idea of belonging partially to two cultures but never entirely to either, is a common Chicana experience and defines much of Cisneros’s writing.