The Poetry of Andrés Montoya: Mystic Homo Sacer

Abstract

I argue that the renowned Chicano poet Andrés Montoya (1968–1999) is a mystic poet. Lyrically on par with Saint Francis of Assisi, Saint Teresa of Avila, Rumi, and Meister Eckhart, Montoya’s mystic poetic expression develops and is portrayed via the intelligent, communicative body (the soma); the same entity that simultaneously expresses the weight of social chains in which his poetic speaker and his community are ensconced. I argue that Montoya’s poetic subject is a communal soma, biblical with the force of Divine Sophia and the Mayan principle of In Lak’ech. Montoya crystallizes a decolonizing poetic subjectivity of a collective spiritual aspirant inspired by Chicanx liberation theology. I argue that Montoya’s collection the ice worker sings and other poems is a spiritual journey of the soma, of a collective Chicano homo sacer evolving his mystic communion with God.