Handling Destiny
Chris Abani:
"Adrian Castro weaves myth, history, music, courage, spirit and heart deep with knowledge and tenderness into a poetry that is all fire: an original and essential voice."
Praise for Adrian Castro
Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
"Castro is a Whitman, not of America, but of all the Americas."
New York Times Book Review:
"[Castro] writes poems about the Caribbean melting pot in sinuous and syncopated lines peppered with Spanish, Creole and West African phrases. . . . His poems seem to be trying to dance their way off the page as they move through whiplash enjambments and elastic line lengths, leaping over white space and letting out occasional ecstatic yelps."
Miami Herald:
"Castro has long been layering Spanish, English, and Yoruba dialects, musical sound, and drum rhythms, Cuba, Miami, Africa, and the Santeria religion. . . . he seems well on the way to inventing a brand new Miami patois."
New Times Broward-Palm Beach:
"Called to the priesthood by verse and inspired by African poets known as griots, Adrian Castro writes and recites rhythmic tales of history, civilization, and spirituality. . . . A self-described "poet of place' who works best in tropical surroundings, [Castro] is a babalao, or high priest of the Yoruba religion, from which Santeria evolved. His pulsating recitals combine the English, Spanish, and African languages and emphasize myth and migration."
QBR: The Black Book Review:
"[Castro's] words are sharp, layered, musical, and . . . seem influenced by hip hop as much as by bembes (Yoruba ceremonies)."
Poetry Flash:
"Castro is a powerful, heartful performance poet, confecting English, Spanish and Yoruba dialects, santeria, musical and drum rhythms."
Campbell McGrath:
"Adrian Castro is fast becoming our foremost poet of the Caribbean, that crossroad of the Americas whose multiple cultures and languages he knows and speaks so fluently. His poetry is ecstatic, drum-propelled, lyrically empowered, spiritually questing, restlessly exploring the flyways of diaspora and exile from Puerto Rico to Haiti to Florida, from Cuba to Jamaica to Colombia, yet the idiom it inhabits is purely American. For all his journeying Adrian Castro is never away from home, because, like the hermit crab, he carries it on his back."
Quincy Troupe:
"The poetry of Adrian Castro fuses Spanish, Spanglish, and various dialects of the English/American language in a dazzlingly lyrical way. Influenced by the poetry of Victor Hernández Cruz, who pioneered this fascinating linguistic mix and fusion, Castro's poetry breathes life into and pulsates through the nexus of many cultural crossroads: Cuban, Haitian, Puerto Rican, Dominican as well as that of a cross-fertilized United States."
Chris Abani:
"Adrian Castro weaves myth, history, music, courage, spirit and heart deep with knowledge and tenderness into a poetry that is all fire: an original and essential voice."
Praise for Adrian Castro
Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
"Castro is a Whitman, not of America, but of all the Americas."
New York Times Book Review:
"[Castro] writes poems about the Caribbean melting pot in sinuous and syncopated lines peppered with Spanish, Creole and West African phrases. . . . His poems seem to be trying to dance their way off the page as they move through whiplash enjambments and elastic line lengths, leaping over white space and letting out occasional ecstatic yelps."
Miami Herald:
"Castro has long been layering Spanish, English, and Yoruba dialects, musical sound, and drum rhythms, Cuba, Miami, Africa, and the Santeria religion. . . . he seems well on the way to inventing a brand new Miami patois."
New Times Broward-Palm Beach:
"Called to the priesthood by verse and inspired by African poets known as griots, Adrian Castro writes and recites rhythmic tales of history, civilization, and spirituality. . . . A self-described "poet of place' who works best in tropical surroundings, [Castro] is a babalao, or high priest of the Yoruba religion, from which Santeria evolved. His pulsating recitals combine the English, Spanish, and African languages and emphasize myth and migration."
QBR: The Black Book Review:
"[Castro's] words are sharp, layered, musical, and . . . seem influenced by hip hop as much as by bembes (Yoruba ceremonies)."
Poetry Flash:
"Castro is a powerful, heartful performance poet, confecting English, Spanish and Yoruba dialects, santeria, musical and drum rhythms."
Campbell McGrath:
"Adrian Castro is fast becoming our foremost poet of the Caribbean, that crossroad of the Americas whose multiple cultures and languages he knows and speaks so fluently. His poetry is ecstatic, drum-propelled, lyrically empowered, spiritually questing, restlessly exploring the flyways of diaspora and exile from Puerto Rico to Haiti to Florida, from Cuba to Jamaica to Colombia, yet the idiom it inhabits is purely American. For all his journeying Adrian Castro is never away from home, because, like the hermit crab, he carries it on his back."
Quincy Troupe:
"The poetry of Adrian Castro fuses Spanish, Spanglish, and various dialects of the English/American language in a dazzlingly lyrical way. Influenced by the poetry of Victor Hernández Cruz, who pioneered this fascinating linguistic mix and fusion, Castro's poetry breathes life into and pulsates through the nexus of many cultural crossroads: Cuban, Haitian, Puerto Rican, Dominican as well as that of a cross-fertilized United States."
