Every summer, Juan Palomo squeezed into the backseat of his father’s ’52 Plymouth for his family’s annual migration. “Like birds,” his people knew “shiny fruit beckoned” in northern fields where they harvested beets and cucumbers. The youngest of seven children, Palomo traveled with his parents, who were migrant Mexican farm workers, to Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Utah, California, and North Dakota where he was born.
Palomo’s name will probably be familiar to some readers; he has covered religion at the Houston Post and the Austin American-Statesman. In the ’90s, he wrote a monthly column for USA Today. Now retired and living in Houston, Palomo’s long career as a journalist serves him well in a new genre; his economy of words, precise details, and clean style provide easy access to his debut poetry chapbook AL NORTE.
