“Finally, a body of work from the school of Nuyorican Poetry that calls us from the street while we’re on the rooftop making faces at the stars. You can feel the steam of winter wreck our souls in Papoleto’s verse; in it, you find the cascading flow of personal and political evolution born of chaos and fracture. Poetry has never spoke louder; same goes for love in this collection. Let Papoleto’s book serve as a chronicle of transnational awakening.”

Willie Perdomo, author of Smoking Lovely

“Meléndez is the true voice of a poet, who disrobes society for us to see it raw and naked as it is in its own skin. Many of us are not ready to see society as it is. Papoleto brings us closer through his [magnifying] glass of words, drawing us to the sad, dark, and rebellious part of our humanity that deserves to be seen and analyzed. His poetry represents freedom of speech and thinking, bringing voice to the often silenced perspectives in our society. I look forward to sharing these poems with my friends and students—we are all in need of a linguistic venue for our critical thinking.”

Melissa Nieves, Union Settlement Association