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Umpierre-Herrera, Luz Maria. I'm Still Standing: treinta años de poesia/Thirty Years ofPoetrv. Ed. Daniel Torres and Carmen S. Rivera. Orlando: www.luzmaumpierre.com, 2011. 232 pp. ISBN 978-1-257-99437-3.
From modest beginnings, Luz Maria (Luzma) Umpierre has become a major figure and icon of contemporary Puerto Rican literature and culture. Umpierre's latest work, I'm Still Standing: treinta años de poesia/Thirty Years of Poetry, is Luz Maria (Luzma), serves as a testament to her devotion to poetry, immigration studies, Caribbean, Latin American and Latino Studies. Although I'm Still Standing is ingeniously edited by Daniel Torres and Carmen S. Rivera and includes a marvelous interview conducted by Nemir Matos-Cintrón, one of the poet's latest "muses," the words that most brilliantly echo throughout this work are those of the poet, scholar, human rights advocate and teacher herself, Luzma Umpierre. In this labor of love, she articulates her luminous vision for equality and social justice, one that particularly speaks to the often silenced needs of Lesbians. As a volume of collected works that dates back to her 1979 Una puertorriqueña en Penna, and ends with an essay entitled, "Manifesto: Whose Taboos? Theirs, Yours or Ours?" one should note that Umpierre leaves herself remarkably, and unabashedly open to a thorough critical examination. Umpierre's brazen, forthright approach serves as evidence that she not only remains dedicated to the struggles she experienced long ago, but continues to see herself as an advocate of the marginalized individuals who continue to experience injustice on the basis of their race, ethnicity or sexual orientation on a daily basis.
In the essay, "On Still Standing," the Umpierre introduces herself to her readers with simple, lucid language. Although she does not tell of growing up in a house surrounded by an extended, loving family that made sure to encourage Umpierre's academic success-details the poet proudly affirms in previous interviews and articles as well as in the interview conducted by Matos-Cintrón in this book-she does talk about the impact of sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of a neighbor. She affirms that she chose to compile her previous works together in I'm Still Standing to let these pieces speak for themselves. To have written a biography rather than to have gathered these works in a kind of collage would have...