Is this the time to hear or read the tale of an undocumented immigrant? With a true-life saga as gripping as “Solito: A Memoir,” as soon as possible is what’s right. Perhaps the only unfortunate matter with timing is that poet/memoirist Javier Zamora’s arrival in Louisville—to accept an award as part of Spalding University’s semi-annual Festival of Contemporary Writing, and to speak at the public library’s main branch—comes after this year’s very consequential Election Day. Matters of immigration and the U.S. southern border may be on the top of mind for many, and Zamora’s appearance a week late might bring about some feelings of lost opportunity.
The poetry he’s written throughout his adult life includes bravura collection “Unaccompanied,” and a total body of work that has brought him fellowships at Stanford and Harvard. But “Solito” is first-person creative nonfiction reflecting the most trying days of his life—when at age 9, Zamora journeyed from El Salvador toward the destination where his parents had gone before—to California.
His father arrived in America nearly a decade ago, and his mother followed a few years later. They dutifully sent money to the relatives caring for Javier—including funds intended to eventually get the boy across the multiple borders and unforgiving landscapes. Funds that would go into the hands of someone they’d have to trust as their son’s guide and protector. Or as they’re now referred to: coyote.
All of the Javier’s family, and the people around his small hometown, speak with anticipation about his “trip,” while payments are passed around and plans made. Out in the wilds, especially through the desert and across the path of those with guns (whether or not they also have uniforms), damn little will go according to plan.
“Every pollero promises us vans we never make it to…”—but the word of eventual importance is we. Young Javier finds fellow travelers along the haphazard route—and some sympathetic souls in similar plight become just enough of a familia that there is companionship. Additional eyes to watch out and alternative perspectives as to what might be a trap, or who might have an idea of where to find a little food or water. And who might turn out to betray, be cowardly…be like Marcelo. Goodbye to the coyote.
Zamora writes with exquisite tactile sensory detail. Many of his casual metaphors sing of little wonders in nature and shelter. (Of twilight, just after the birds go quiet: “Small brown bats take over, making noises like keys hitting keys, or like zippers hitting metal.”) These observations blend the original child’s-eye interpretation with the discipline of meter and vocabulary that Zamora has since mastered.
The dialogue exchanges easily take on the burden of weighing hope and fear, expressed through a pre-adolescent’s all-too-understandable vulnerability and his attempts to take some things in stride. But at other times he must summon courage, sometimes as if he was in an action film. And in the last reel, “The Six” has become four who have reached a safe house—across the final border, but nowhere near the end of an anxiety that’s always alongside their determination. But for the youngest of them, there is a final moment, expressed on the page in sweet understatement, and readers will greet it with a sigh if not tears.
Tuesday Nov. 12 at 6 p.m. Javier Zamora will be at Louisville Free Public Library, 301 York Street. Event is free but registration is requested (LFPL.org/Authors; 574-1644).
This article appears in Nov 4-19, 2024.