Why do we do the things we do when we’re young? Brenda Cárdenas recalls nights sneaking out of the house as a teenager, looking for highs, looking for company. “Why would you do that?” is the adult question throughout the poem. “Why wouldn’t I?” is a reply.

Brenda Cárdenas is the author of the poetry collection Trace (Red Hen Press, 2023). Cárdena’s works include Boomerang (Bilingual Press, 2009), the chapbook Bread of the Earth/The Last Colors (Decentralized Publications, 2011), co-authored with her husband Roberto Harrison, and From the Tongues of Brick and Stone (Momotombo Press, 2005). She also co-edited Resist Much/Obey Little: Inaugural Poems to the Resistance (Spuyten Duyvil Press, 2017) and Between the Heart and the Land: Latina Poets in the Midwest (MARCH/Abrazo Press, 2001). She has served as faculty for the CantoMundo writers’ retreat and as Milwaukee Poet Laureate. She currently teaches creative writing and Latinx literature at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Brenda Cárdenas’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.