Small town boy journeys from Ponce, Puerto Rico to Manhattan: a riff on many famous movies and books. Except in this case the boy is gay, confused, frightened, and trying to find where he will fit in and be happy.
The story has a happy ending—of sorts. Boy from Ponce finds companionship, happiness, and his proud gay identity in the Big City. But it also has a sad ending—of sorts. Boy from Ponce finds out he has HIV, almost dies, gets almost well, then meets another illness—Inclusion Body Myositis. He is confined to a wheelchair. And yet—
In the same year he becomes wheelchair-bound, the man rediscovers an old love: writing poetry. He begins to write. He writes more. He becomes adept. His poetry soars. “This,” he says, “is what I should have been doing all along.”
As you read the poems of Félix Garmendía, you will say to yourself, “This is what I should have been reading all along.” You will discern influences from Whitman, from Neruda, and also from the art of Frida Kahlo, with whom Felix feels a particularly strong kinship as a disabled artist. After all, he says, they both fly on invisible wings.
In this book you will discover poems light as the summer art in Fort Tryon Park, poems as down and raunchy as a honky-tonk on Canal Street, poems as pensive and stately as the Statue of Liberty and her pedestal. For in many ways this book also pays homage to New York, Félix’s fiercely loved home since 1988.
Happy, sad, frightened, soaring, ecstatic, loving. Moods galore and then some. Images that magic you from deep anguish to utter excitement and bliss. Come fly with Félix. You will never read anything quite like these poems. You may even find your own invisible wings.
