My Sweet Unconditional: Poems

In her debut collection of poems, My Sweet Unconditional, ariel robello meets us at the horizon, where worlds blend in the blush of sunrise and sunset, where land meets sea, air meets earth, and where man and machine interrupt the natural ebb and flow of life. Unapologetically, she declares her faith in a love that defies borders and with each poem she weds herself to a belief that unconditional love can still be found in the cracks of an urban sidewalk, dancing above puffing smoke stacks, behind a guerrilla's mask, in the worn paint brush of an island love, blundering below a street lamp in Ensenada, spelled out in daisies on a veteran's tombstone, in the stitch of a huipil and most importantly-deep inside one's own reflection. With language as radiant and dangerous as broken glass ariel robello cuts away at the political dogma and superficial beauty of a world unhinged to reveal a bloody but dignified glimpse of love in the hands of a New World survivor.

Having earned her chops on both the stage and the page, ariel robello represents a generation who are as concerned with the presentation of their works as they are with line breaks. She received a PEN West Rosenthal Emerging Voices Fellowship in 2002 and is currently a poetry teacher in Los Angeles Public High Schools and an English teacher in the garment district.