Overview

Alegría's poem "Accounting" is an accounting of the important events of her life. The first few lines tell the reader that the poem's author remembers certain events in her life that she defines as "electrical instants." What follows are vignettes from the author's memory, beginning with her childhood recollections. Alegría's memories make the leap from skipping puddles to losing her virginity in only a few lines. She also recalls painful memories—the death of her mother, the assassination of Archbishop Romero, and the occupation of Nicaragua. Coupled with memories of loss are memories of love. Alegría compresses a lifetime of events into the few moments that a reader takes to study the poem. She dissolves the barrier of time and reduces her existence into twenty-six lines.

It is sometimes a mistake to assume the author and the poem's narrator are one...