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Reborn
Delve into actor Abraham Rodriguez's raw journey of intimacy, sexual identity, religion, and self-discovery through captivating visuals and bilingual verse.
Step into the vivid world of Reborn, the second collection of poems and photographs by actor Abraham Rodriguez. Delve into a raw and personal journey of intimacy, sexual identity, religion, and self-discovery through captivating visuals and confessional verse in both English and Spanish. Rodriguez's lens captures the essence of transformation, guiding you through the shadows to embrace a rebirth that illuminates even the darkest nights, fostering healing and unveiling new opportunities. Are you ready to be reborn?
Step into the vivid world of Reborn, the second collection of poems and photographs by actor Abraham Rodriguez. Delve into a raw and personal journey of intimacy, sexual identity, religion, and self-discovery through captivating visuals and confessional verse in both English and Spanish. Rodriguez's lens captures the essence of transformation, guiding you through the shadows to embrace a rebirth that illuminates even the darkest nights, fostering healing and unveiling new opportunities. Are you ready to be reborn?
- GenresPoetry
102 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 4, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
April 26, 2024
3,5 ⭐
Thank you NetGalley for giving me this ARC. I like it so much! 💗
This book of poems tells us a little about the not-so-easy life that actor Abraham Rodriguez has had. I honestly didn't think the poems were going to be so revealing, but wow, I really liked them a lot.
Thank you NetGalley for giving me this ARC. I like it so much! 💗
This book of poems tells us a little about the not-so-easy life that actor Abraham Rodriguez has had. I honestly didn't think the poems were going to be so revealing, but wow, I really liked them a lot.
December 23, 2024
Thank you Central Avenue Publishing for the free book!
Reborn is a short poetry collection about self-discovery. Accepting your gender identity and breaking barriers. So good 💚
Reborn is a short poetry collection about self-discovery. Accepting your gender identity and breaking barriers. So good 💚
March 28, 2024
this was very powerful and you could feel the hurt and pain the author went through on every single page. I feel like the author put his entire soul on the pages of this book of poetry and i don’t feel it is fair to his truth to rate if any lower than 5 stars.
April 15, 2024
Firstly I wanted to thank NetGalley for the chance to read an advanced copy of this book.
This is a collection of modern poetry in which Rodriguez shares his thoughts and experiences through free verses.
I must be honest, it's not my favorite style of poetry but the topics were deep and you could perceive the author's pain from beginning to end.
He once said that the best advice he has ever received was "Be how you feel. Feel what you feel". I'm glad he got to express himself, to be so vulnerable through this collection and make something positive out of the darkness.
'I realized a memory doesn't have to be a bad thing.'
This is a collection of modern poetry in which Rodriguez shares his thoughts and experiences through free verses.
I must be honest, it's not my favorite style of poetry but the topics were deep and you could perceive the author's pain from beginning to end.
He once said that the best advice he has ever received was "Be how you feel. Feel what you feel". I'm glad he got to express himself, to be so vulnerable through this collection and make something positive out of the darkness.
'I realized a memory doesn't have to be a bad thing.'
April 13, 2024
The photographs included are quite nice and go with the poems. While I think the author has been through a terrible experience, as poetry this doesn’t entirely work for me, and he, once again, sounds like every other modern poet.
Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read and review this book.
Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read and review this book.
March 20, 2024
This was some of the best LGBTQ+ poetry I've read in a while
It was beautiful and heartbreaking and in the end comforting
It was beautiful and heartbreaking and in the end comforting
August 16, 2024
8/15/2024 I can't be the only one thinking this reads like a blueprint of a bigger, better book? I hope he eventually writes that, too! Full review tk at TheFrumiousConsortium.net.
8/16/2024 On the one hand, I'm happy for the interest in poetry that the viral success of Rupi Kaur has brought mainstream. On the other, well, you get the feeling that everyone feels that they can write poetry now.
And yes, to a certain extent, everyone can write poetry. But too often writers confuse epigraphs with epigrams, and churn out the former while utterly convinced that they're producing the latter. Abraham Rodriguez is a talented performer and a writer with plenty of potential who has also, alas, fallen victim to this mindset. There are some really good poems in this second collection of his, but there are also several baffling choices in the shorter works that speak, I believe, to his relative youth (he's 24!) and perhaps to a need for a more rigorous cutting process, if not outright rethinking of the shape of the finished book.
Honestly, as I was reading this collection, I kept feeling less like it was a completed entity and more like the blueprint for what could be a really impressive memoir or novel in verse. The progression of the poems goes from Mr Rodriguez's childhood; his struggles with the church and the abuse he suffered; the pleasures and heartbreak of sex and romance, and his experiences in Hollywood, as well as the body image issues he suffered as someone who must, of necessity, trade on his looks to succeed. He writes on all these subjects with honesty and raw emotion, so there's no doubting the creative core that lies at the heart of this endeavor. But while this collection works just fine altogether, too few of the poems are capable of standing alone. "Welcome to the closet" and "Counting my calories" are fortunately some of the stronger pieces. "Whose fault is that?" and "We take turns", on the other hand, aren't anywhere near as clever as they're trying to be.
That said, I do strongly feel that even those pieces would work quite well incorporated into a larger verse form. Plucked out of the whole and with a spotlight shone on them as individual poems, they elicit -- and I hate to say this -- cringe, but they would add so much strength to a broader narrative explicitly built to tell a coherent story. Because Mr Rodriguez's story is fascinating, even as he displays it only in disjointed bits and pieces here. If he brought it all together like Jacqueline Woodson does, for example, in her own verse memoir Brown Girl Dreaming, it would so greatly focus the impact of everything he has to say. And I don't think he'd shy away from trying something so different from the poetry mainstream, given how the titles of his poems come at the end of his verses and how he includes the Spanish versions of several works alongside the English. This collection felt very much like a book yearning to coalesce around a narrative. Fortunately for the poet, he shows every indication of being able to keep honing his craft in that direction.
Anyway, I very much hope that that's where Mr Rodriguez's writing career is heading. His photography isn't bad, tho the pieces that play with color and contrast are far more interesting than some of the oddly drab Hollywood exterior shots. Honestly, I'm impressed that he finds the time to do all he does, between his acting career and owning a home decor brand. His poetry isn't quite where it needs to be yet, but the potential is definitely there.
Reborn by Abraham Rodriguez was published June 4 2024 by Central Avenue Poetry and is available from all good booksellers, including Bookshop!
8/16/2024 On the one hand, I'm happy for the interest in poetry that the viral success of Rupi Kaur has brought mainstream. On the other, well, you get the feeling that everyone feels that they can write poetry now.
And yes, to a certain extent, everyone can write poetry. But too often writers confuse epigraphs with epigrams, and churn out the former while utterly convinced that they're producing the latter. Abraham Rodriguez is a talented performer and a writer with plenty of potential who has also, alas, fallen victim to this mindset. There are some really good poems in this second collection of his, but there are also several baffling choices in the shorter works that speak, I believe, to his relative youth (he's 24!) and perhaps to a need for a more rigorous cutting process, if not outright rethinking of the shape of the finished book.
Honestly, as I was reading this collection, I kept feeling less like it was a completed entity and more like the blueprint for what could be a really impressive memoir or novel in verse. The progression of the poems goes from Mr Rodriguez's childhood; his struggles with the church and the abuse he suffered; the pleasures and heartbreak of sex and romance, and his experiences in Hollywood, as well as the body image issues he suffered as someone who must, of necessity, trade on his looks to succeed. He writes on all these subjects with honesty and raw emotion, so there's no doubting the creative core that lies at the heart of this endeavor. But while this collection works just fine altogether, too few of the poems are capable of standing alone. "Welcome to the closet" and "Counting my calories" are fortunately some of the stronger pieces. "Whose fault is that?" and "We take turns", on the other hand, aren't anywhere near as clever as they're trying to be.
That said, I do strongly feel that even those pieces would work quite well incorporated into a larger verse form. Plucked out of the whole and with a spotlight shone on them as individual poems, they elicit -- and I hate to say this -- cringe, but they would add so much strength to a broader narrative explicitly built to tell a coherent story. Because Mr Rodriguez's story is fascinating, even as he displays it only in disjointed bits and pieces here. If he brought it all together like Jacqueline Woodson does, for example, in her own verse memoir Brown Girl Dreaming, it would so greatly focus the impact of everything he has to say. And I don't think he'd shy away from trying something so different from the poetry mainstream, given how the titles of his poems come at the end of his verses and how he includes the Spanish versions of several works alongside the English. This collection felt very much like a book yearning to coalesce around a narrative. Fortunately for the poet, he shows every indication of being able to keep honing his craft in that direction.
Anyway, I very much hope that that's where Mr Rodriguez's writing career is heading. His photography isn't bad, tho the pieces that play with color and contrast are far more interesting than some of the oddly drab Hollywood exterior shots. Honestly, I'm impressed that he finds the time to do all he does, between his acting career and owning a home decor brand. His poetry isn't quite where it needs to be yet, but the potential is definitely there.
Reborn by Abraham Rodriguez was published June 4 2024 by Central Avenue Poetry and is available from all good booksellers, including Bookshop!
June 16, 2025
Buen poemario, algunas imagenes me descolocaron un poco ya que en la edicion que me brindaron,estaban desfazadas y no tenian contexto al poema que se presentaba...
Mas allá de eso, creo que la prosa esta muy bien lograda y, aunque es corto, logra ahondar en los temas que trata. Es un poemario bastante crudo.
Mas allá de eso, creo que la prosa esta muy bien lograda y, aunque es corto, logra ahondar en los temas que trata. Es un poemario bastante crudo.
December 30, 2024
What a way to tell a story through verse. Touching and beautiful!
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews