The Poet X Summary and Analysis

Summary: Part I: In the Beginning Was the Word [Stoop-Sitting — It’s Only the First Week of Tenth Grade]

Xiomara sits on her stoop in late August. It’s the week before school is to start, and she hears the sounds of summer. Drug dealers on her Harlem block tell her she should wear revealing dresses, but she ignores them and sneaks upstairs before Mami comes home from work. Xiomara feels like she is unable to hide in her Dominican neighborhood. She has always been big, but now she’s developed a womanly figure. When people insult her body, she fights. She’s made her “skin just as thick” as her body.

Mami always addresses Xiomara beginning with “Mira, muchacha . . .” or “Look, girl . . .” Xiomara spends many of her conversations with Mami being corrected: even when she isn’t doing anything wrong, Mami assumes she is. Xiomara thinks that no one listens to her. Xiomara’s name means “ready for war,” and Mami hates that the name ended up being perfectly fitting. Her twin, Xavier, whom she just calls Twin, was born easily, but Xiomara’s birth required an emergency C-section. People can’t pronounce her name, but she’s trained herself not to care. People are always telling Xiomara, “Pero, tú no es fácil,” which means “You sure ain’t an easy one.” In fact, it’s the first thing Papi says to her after Mami’s difficult birthing experience.

Mami works hard as a cleaner in Queens. She commutes an hour each way but spends the time reading her Bible and attends Mass even after her long day. Mami is very devout and insists Xiomara attend confirmation class. But Xiomara has questions about God and says, “Jesus feels like a friend . . . who invites himself over too often, who texts me too much.” Much of this stems from feeling like the church treats her as if her worth is tied to being a good girl and cares little about her thoughts. Yet Xiomara feels she owes a “debt to God” for being born. When she tries to talk to Mami about confirmation, Mami says she’ll send her to the Dominican Republic. Xiomara looks at Mami’s scarred knuckles and knows how she was taught piety.

Mami and Papi were older when they had Xiomara and Twin and had given up hope of having children. Thus, they consider the twins to be miracles. Papi gave up drinking and womanizing when he learned he would be a father. Mami, who wanted to become a nun but was forced to marry Papi, gave Xiomara a baby bracelet engraved with “Mi Hija” (“My Daughter”) and became even more devout. Xiomara hates the burden of being a miracle, and not even Twin understands the pressure.

At confirmation class, the other students stare at Xiomara and her friend Caridad, angering Xiomara. Father Sean, Xiomara’s parish priest, explains that confirmation class is a serious time to deepen faith. Instead of participating, Xiomara whispers with Caridad about boys. Caridad is devout like Xiomara’s mother; in her attitude and behavior, she’s everything Xiomara isn’t. The two are unlikely friends, but Caridad knows Xiomara best of anyone in the world and always supports her. Xiomara has lots of questions, particularly about boys. She doesn’t even know what she thinks about them because she’s never been able to know what life would be like without Mami’s rules.

The night before the first day of school, Xiomara lies in bed feeling like her skin is too small for everything inside of her. She feels like she’s beginning. Her school is an old building that she calls “hood,” not like Twin’s futuristic “genius school.” For Xiomara, school is something to get through and eventually escape. Her English teacher, Ms. Galiano, surprises her. She’s heard Ms. Galiano is strict, but she turns out to be bright and outgoing as well. For the first time, Xiomara feels like someone might actually hear what she wants to say.

For the rough draft of her first English assignment, Xiomara writes about starting her period. She was in fifth grade, and Mami had never told her what to do. She Googled “Blood down there,” then bought tampons. Mami slapped her and told her, “Good girls don’t wear tampons,” implying that Xiomara wasn’t a virgin. In a later draft, Xiomara changes her topic to the birthday that Twin gave her a notebook. Writing, she realizes, has given her an outlet to keep from hurting.

Xiomara always goes straight home after school, eats an apple, and cleans. She doesn’t think it’s fair that Twin doesn’t have to do chores, but Mami just tells her life isn’t fair. Xiomara says that Mami relates better to Twin, who is devout. While cleaning, Xiomara throws a religious craft of his out the window. She says she will apologize and knows Twin will pretend to believe her that it was an accident. Twin’s real name is Xavier—he is named for a saint, unlike Xiomara. She calls him Twin because she’s the only person who can call him that. Xiomara sees herself as Twin’s protector because he was born “a soft whistle.”

Analysis: Part I: In the Beginning Was the Word [Stoop-Sitting — It’s Only the First Week of Tenth Grade]

The novel begins with Xiomara being harassed by men as she enjoys the last bit of her summer. Throughout the section, Xiomara expresses feeling too big, too female, something she associates with a sense of shame in her own sexuality. She will continue to connect this feeling to teachings of her church, Dominican cultural attitudes, and her mother’s position toward her. Mami once viewed her as a precious gift, a reward even, until Xiomara began developing too early, as if the attention from men were Xiomara’s fault. Xiomara has responded to this by learning to fight, defending herself when no one else is willing to.

This section develops the dynamic between Xiomara and her family. Because Mami and Papi were unable to have children for so long, she feels the pressure of being a miracle. Mami feels that Xiomara is the reward for her piety and staying married to Papi; Papi became a good man only when his children were born. In reality, both are miserable. Xiomara recognizes this, but it only furthers her feelings of resentment toward her mother and the church, which she compares to a prison.

This section also introduces the counterpoint between Twin and Xiomara. They are at once total opposites and a complete pair. Xiomara is fiercely protective of Twin but also wishes he would protect her instead of the other way around. In a way, Xiomara’s expectations of Twin seem to mirror Mami’s expectations of her—she wants Twin to become something he isn’t, just as Mami wants her to fit into the mold of a demure, faithful young woman.