The poet Alejandro Jiménez tells of his experiences on migration through poetry.
Alejandro Jiménez is a poet, writer, and educator born in Colima, Mexico, currently residing in New Mexico. He has participated in TEDx conferences on various occasions, in addition to being a semi-finalist twice at the National Poetry Slam.
In 1989, when he was two years old, Alejandro's mother migrated to the United States. Years later in 1995, Alejandro came to the United States at the age of eight. Alejandro currently resides legally in New Mexico, and explains what it was like to leave Mexico at such a young age. "Leave all the culture, friends, family, for this American dream that they sell to you."
Jiménez, is a spokenwordpoetry interpreter, who combines elements of theater, music within poetry. His work addresses issues such as cultural identity, immigrant narratives, masculinity, and memory. The interpreter explains that he began his path as a poet more than ten years ago.
His experience as an immigrant and his nostalgia for his place of origin in Colima have been captured in his performances. Late last year he participated in TEDx Denver with a poem called "The Garden." “It is a poem about the garden of my town, there in La Caja. About all the memories I have of being a child in the garden and running around barefoot, naked, with trusses and seeing the whole circle of life in that garden ”.
Currently, Jiménez serves as an advisor to high schoolstudents, to guide them in their educational decision making. "Before I didn't see it, but now working with young people is that 'Ah, of course! I went through that too! And you're going through that too, or your parents went through that. ' So the experience gives you a certain credibility in the community I work with, ”he explains.
