Juan Felipe Herrera (US Poet Laureate, 2015-2016) created these 22 poems in both Spanish an d English after traveling to City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco and finding a copy of Hunk of Skin, a book of poems written by Pablo Picasso. In his collection, Herrera weaves memories of his childhood, with scenes of Picasso’s own life. Picasso’s Greek book stamps are woven together with Herrera’s memory of smelling “watermelon perfume.” Herrera also marries his childhood memories with the modern day. A maraca covered in scenes from his own culture when shaken sounds like shots fired in Bosnia.

Herrera was named the new U.S. Poet Laureate in 2015; this little book was published in 1998.

The author was inspired by Picasso's poems, which Herrera says "...are like his [Picasso's] famous paintings; faces, flavors, and places from different worlds are brought together in quick strokes of color and imagination." I wonder if the verses in Spanish seem as much like free association as the English versions do. ( )

This is a nice collection of Latin influenced poems that are written on all different subjects. The poems are a mix of English and Spanish. They are simply illustrated. ( )

This book is fiction because it is a book of many different poems. The art in this book is very simple computer -drawn pictures. They are all black and white and are small pictures in the margins. The content in this book includes both english and spanish poems about rhythm and dance. The spanish poems are written on the left side of the page and the english version is written on the right side. The reading level is sixth grade because the word are kind of hard. The curricular connection is foreign language because the poems are written in both english and spanish.