Who Burns for the Perfection of Paper

"The Assassination of the Landlord’s Purple Vintage 1976 Monte Carlo" by Martin Espada (2018)

This prose poem shows the playful side of Espada, while sticking closely to his lifelong themes of the battle between the underprivileged and their would-be exploiters. In this one, a moose takes revenge on behalf of tenants by using its antlers to attack the landlord’s expensive car. While noting the brutal reaction of hunters who try to hit the animal with a crossbow, Espada ends with a triumphant cry of ‘Huzzah!’ as the moose escapes and the car is hit instead.

"The Chosen Ones" by Pablo Neruda (republished 2000)

In this famous poem, Neruda speaks in the voice of those who died in conflicts at various stages of Latin American history. The poem viscerally captures the bitterness of dying an anonymous death, and the desperate desire for justice beyond the grave.

"Charlie Howard’s Descent" by Mark Doty (2012)

Emerging onto the scene around the same time as Espada, Doty’s poems often memorialize the victims of AIDS, or in this poem, the murder of a gay man. Both poets draw on lived experience and favor free verse, though, as here, Doty tends to employ regular stanza forms.