14/05/2026
⭕ “We all have moons / we long to return to,” writes Ariel Francisco, staying attuned to the singing of young men along the East River and the Bronx or the radio waves of his grandmother reciting poetry. These poems share valences with the Dominican poet that Francisco translated, Jacques Viau Renaud, who writes about his homeland, with its legacies of imperialism and colonization. In this installment of The American Wing, Carlie Hoffman and Tiffany Troy present a conversation and three poems by Ariel Francisco, alongside his translations of Jacques Viau Renaud.
Ariel Francisco is the author of the forthcoming We All Have Moons We Long to Return to (Texas Review Press 2028), All the Places We Love Have Been Left in Ruins (Burrow Press 2024), Under Capitalism if Your Head Aches They Just Yank Off Your Head (Flowersong Press 2022), A Sinking Ship is Still a Ship (Burrow Press 2020), All My Heroes are Broke (C&R Press 2017), and eight books of translations from Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, and Haiti. His work has been published in The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, Academy of American Poets, POETRY Magazine, the New York City Ballet, and elsewhere. He is an Assistant Professor of Poetry and Hispanic Studies at Louisiana State University.
Jacques Viau Renaud (1941—1965) was born in Haiti and raised in the Dominican Republic following his father's exile in 1948. During the Dominican Revolution of 1965, he joined the rebel forces in support of ousted president Juan Bosch, fighting against the US backed dictatorship. He was killed in battle at age 23. Poesia Completa was published by Editorial Cielonaranja in the Dominican Republic in 2005 and Selections From Permanence of the Cry and Other Poems (CUNY Lost & Found) and Poet of One Island (Get Fresh Books), his first English translations, were published in 2024.
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francisco.henriquez .troy