Unwoven Paperback – December 17, 2014

After years of being a major component in the glue that has helped unite and shape the community of artists, poets, and academics doing such awesome work in deep, south Texas, readers finally get to enjoy the work of Erika Garza-Johnson on the page. Unwoven, published by FlowerSong Books, is her first collection of poetry, although she has worked on various other collections in various capacities. Erika Garza-Johnson has always been here, and now there is proof. Garza-Johnson does not disappoint with this long awaited collection. This book is something between an ever turning kaleidoscope and a car radio set to “scan”. Fleeting images and impressions float by as you enjoy these poems. There are hail storms and tequila, paeans to the work of Madonna and Sylvia Plath and Gaga’s “Bad Romance”, tales of identity and misidentification. Every page shifts our perspective, and we become blessed with a new angle, a new perspective with every one. More than any collection I have recently read, Unwoven captures the poet in such a true and amazing light, that it can fall somewhere between intimacy and voyeurism. Erika Garza-Johnson’s life itself can be described as a kaleidoscope, as I suppose, many of ours can, but hers is here for us to examine, turning it one way, and then another as we soak up these pages. She is teacher, she is mother, she is wife, she is artist, she is daughter, she is Chican@, she is post-Chican@, she is the identity of not wanting to be a label, she is Texas, she is somewhere else. She wants to kill her muse, she glazes porcelain, she keeps promises to the dead, and she knows the view from both the void and the deck of a cruise ship. Unwoven is a slim collection, easily read in one evening…but, after reading it through, you’ll want to dive back in, randomly, maybe…maybe coming back to specific pieces. Just as with kaleidoscopes (or even telescopes), no image looked at twice is exactly the same; I am impressed by how each piece of Garza-Johnson’s gains access to a slightly different understanding, with each reading. This is poetry that does not unravel, from a poet that does not fall apart…but we’re never quite sure, and that’s what makes her writing exciting. Let her words drive you around, through these pages and beyond. You’ll be the better for it. And, yeah, I agree with Erika Garza-Johnson…”America” is a much better poem than “Howl”.

This collection of poetry is one of the most unique I've read. Taking the journey with the poet, you feel you can barely take a breath before the landscape changes, the characters shift and switch places, the past has replaced the present and the present the past, you are here and you are there at the same time, in a quest for identity that only a person living in the land of multiplicities called the "border" can fully relate to. As maddening as such multicultural ensemble of influences and references may be, you are compelled to hear the voices coming from four directions, and in the end the fragmentary nature of the poems does achieve coherence. The voices become one, at once celebratory and mournful, and it is the reflection of one conscience that accepts multiplicity as a way of being. Haunted by La Llorona and Tacuache, obsessed with language and poetry and armed with an expansive heart, this voice will not let you leave the book without engaging with it. You feel as if there is a constant dialogue with you, personally, speaking to you until you are willing to let your guard down and break the borders of emotion, prejudice, and selfishness.

Unwoven is a truly wonderful collection of poetry. Erika Garza-Johnson or “La Erika” offers the reader poems like threads that speak about the experiences of being a woman, mother, teacher, lover, as well as the Chican@ experience in the small border towns of south Texas. In Unwoven, Garza-Johnson deals with themes of identity, gender, race, place, and culture among others. The poetry is candid and down-to-earth; powerful without resorting to clichés or heavy metaphoric language. Garza-Johnson demonstrates that she is an adept poet as she skillfully weaves voice and meaning in a variety of poetic forms, from prose poems to list poems. I highly recommend Unwoven to anyone doing cultural studies and to anyone who loves poetry as well as those who might not know yet that they love it. Congratulations to La Erika and FlowerSong Books for publishing this amazing collection. We need more books like this one.

Erika is both charming, funny, and kind as a person...and these distinctive qualities ring throughout these powerful works. It is safe to say if you enjoy Sylvia Plath's rage, or envision Latinas a certain way, this collection will startle you and bring you challenges. This isn't a woman writing simple and pretty things. This is a collection that races with brutal honesty, yet celebrates life's pleasures and jokes, and doesn't ask the reader to confine him/herself to stereotypes. Garza-Johnson will ask you to let go of those stereotypes you hold, and realize the full humanity of those you seek to label, and she does this in a strong, hopeful manner. This book is as natural an enjoyment as a challenge.

I loved reading “Unwoven” for its depictions of Chicana life through the eyes of Erika Garza-Johnson. Erika is not simply a reporter of brown social life and the Chicana condition. She is wildly imaginative, sometimes caustic, but always enjoyably frank. Her work commands attention for its style and social commentary. Great job, Erika.

Deeply personal and heartfelt poetry. Outstanding collection.

Her poem on grackles rocks.