My Nature Is Hunger

Luis J. Rodriguez has published fifteen books of poetry, children's literature, fiction, and nonfiction. He is best known for his 1993 memoir of gang life, Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. His awards include a Finalist for the 2011 National Book Critics Circle Award, a Lila Wallace Readers Digest Writers Award, a PEN Josephine Miles Literary Award, a Paterson Poetry Prize, a Carl Sandburg Literary Award, and fellowships from the Sundance Institute, the Lannan Foundation, the City of Los Angeles, the City of Chicago, the California Arts Council, and the Illinois Arts Council, among others. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti in 2014 chose Luis J. Rodriguez as Poet Laureate of the city. Luis is also Visiting Scholar at California State University, Northridge.

• from Poems Across the Pavement — 1989Running to AmericaSomebody Was Breaking WindowsRosalie has CandlesThe MonsterPalmasPiece by PieceThe Callingfrom The Concrete River — 1991Watts BleedsTía ChuchaNight Dance—Watts 1975-78The Concrete RiverThe Rooster Who Thought It Was a DogBlack  MexicanThe Bull's Eye InnWaitingDon't Read That Poem!Jarocho BluesJesus SavesThe Blast FurnaceThey Come To DanceCarrying My ToolsBethlehem No MoreEvery RoadEvery Breath, a PrayerLipsfrom Trochemoche — 1998Meeting the Animal in Washington Square ParkVictory, Victoria, My Beautiful WhisperCatacombsto the police officer who refused to sit in the same room as my son because he's a "gang banger"A Tale of Los LobosWoman of the First Street BridgeThe Rabbi and the CholoCinco de MayoCivilizationFireRed ScreamsA Fence of LightsNext GenerationAt Quenchers Bar When You Said GoodbyeThe Face on the RadioThe Object of Intent Is To Get ThereUntouchedA Father's LessonFranciscaSuburbiaBelieve me when I say . . . Reflection on El Train GlassThe Quiet WomanQuestions for Which You Are Always the Answer"Eva sitting on the curb with pen and paper before the torturers came to get her"¡Seguro Que Hell Yes!Poem for Shakespeare & Company¡Yo Voy Ami!Rant, Rave & RicochetCloth of Muscle and HairThe Old Woman of Méridafrom Notes of a Bald CricketNew PoemsMy Name's Not RodríguezCoal-Seller in White DressThe Cockroaches I MarriedMickey Mouse PancakesMy Nature Is HungerExiled in the Country of ReasonPassersbyListening to Return To Forever's "Romantic Warrior" with Susana in an Empty Room of my Recently Rented Echo Park ApartmentMother by the LakeSuicide SweetSometimes a Man ComesTime and NatureLoving What You LeaveRitchie Valens Doesn't Sing Here AnymoreMexika ScienceThe Gold Beneath Our FeetBannedFat The Chuskas— Navajo Land 1998Rez DogsUntitled¡Si, Se Puede! Yes, We Can!Chuparosa (Hummingbird) Nightfall: Poems to Ponder in War and UncertaintyThe Wanton Life

This poetry is of the barrio yet stubbornly refuses to be confined in it-Rodríguez's perceptive gaze and storyteller's gift transport his world across neighborhood boundaries.""-Publishers Weekly on Trochemoche