Books like My Wicked Wicked Ways: Poems

This book is wicked old (as they say in these parts), coming out in 1987. Still, curiosity got the best of me. After teaching her collection of vignettes, The House on Mango Street, over and over and did I say over(?) again, I wondered what Cisneros's poetry would look like.Esperanza, the autobiographical protagonist in Mango, after all, speaks more than once of her poetry. And many vignettes in that book are sheer poetry themselves. Rich in poetic devices.I was a bit disappointed, then, to see that I preferred Cisneros's vignettes to her poetry. At least this collection gets stronger as it goes. Still, overall, a letdown.Here's an example of a poem that wasn't so peachy keen:Peaches---Six in a Tin Bowl, SarajevoIf peaches had armssurely they would hold one anotherin their peach sleep.And if peaches had feet it is sure they wold nudge one anotherwith their soft peachy feet.And if peaches couldthey would sleepwith their dimpled headon the other'seach to each.Like you and me.And sleep and sleep.I dunno. We poets read published work like this and say to ourselves, "Really?" Then we think, "If I sent that in, it'd be rejected sixty-six ways to Sunday. A cruel editor might even comment, 'This is the pits.'"But, yea. There were better poems, too. And I still hold Sandra Cisneros in high regard. Just more for Mangoes than peaches.