Citizen Illegal

“poem where no one is deported” by José Olivarez (2021) 

The speaker envisions an immigration raid the next day of a factory that employs Mexican immigrant women. However, the women outwit the authorities by staying at home on that day, and the immigration officers enter an empty factory. They find only the boxes of socks that the women have placed there and decide that no one works at the factory. The speaker plays with the idea that God, in his benevolent rather than vengeful mode, protected the workers. As with Citizen Illegal, there are several phrases in Spanish, including “si dios quiere,” which means “God willing.” 

“February & my love is in another state” by José Olivarez (2019) 

The poem comprises four unrhymed quatrains followed by an unrhymed couplet. It seems at first that the poem will be about loneliness, since the title states that the speaker’s lover is absent. “i’m the loneliest creature on this block,” he says as he walks down the street. There is a twist in the final couplet, as it seems that the speaker is fine with being alone, and the poem ends with a celebration of solitariness: “[A]lone is the star i follow.