Book Review…From Ruins to Wholeness

Dec 02, 2018 Book Review…, Features / Columnists

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Book: This Is For You
Author: Angel Castillo
Critic: Dr. Glenville Ashby

In her first published work, Angel Castillo proves her salt as a writer of enviable range. At the outset, Castillo paints a world of charred ruins gnawing away at her nascent mind. Her space is crammed, and in psychological terms, there is little maneuverability for triangulation. Suffocating, she must lift the carapace under which she hides in torment. As she stumbles through a cacophony of emotions, her pertinacity is never in question. Hers is an existential search for meaning.
‘Forgiveness,’ a poetic missive to her mother, encapsulates the dynamics that will frame her reality. There is no nuclear family, not that it matters, but there is enough denial, rejection and confusion to demand psychoanalytical enquiry.
“My mother’s anger hasn’t died down yet,” she unleashes, the first of many salvos. She later concedes, “You taught me something special, I learned how to make nothing out of something…because of the way you raised me.”
Arguably, ‘Forgiveness’ is her most provocative offering.
It is hard to imagine that Castillo’s view of the world is not irreconcilably split. Heavily invested in healing, she embraces a world that is more nuanced. Her later experiences, though, prove equally brutal. She screams if only to feel her presence.
From dark musings of suicide, to attempted self-immolation; from drug-fueled efforts to quiet pestering demons, to sexual indulgences to confirm her identity, Castillo delivers her best existential work in ‘Faith.’ It is here that we journey through calcified emotions, a psyche wrought by self-hatred and a psyche ultimately salvaged through marriage to its Redeemer.
“My freshman year of high school,” she writes, “I tied a rope around my neck just right, and that was the first time I can tell you I knew what a hug felt like.”
Later, she shares, “When I turned 20 I held a memorial for the life I was ready to give up, the squiggly scar lined from the razor blade that reminded me I once hated myself enough to die…If only you knew how hard it was to embrace my skin like a suit of armour to share my smile like a love letter handwritten by my grandmother in heaven…”
At last, there is redemption.
Castillo’s anguish extends beyond her person. In the disaffected she finds a common cause. She cries out, her exhortation directed to black men. She understands the perilous waters they tread.
‘Dear Black Men’ is a stirring, detailed commentary on America’s victimized.
“Toy guns, no dolls, football or basketball…
Skip your classes
Come in late
Crips or blood?
Choose your fate
Smoke weed & drink your pain away
Your family don’t listen
Having feelings is gay…” she pens.
She draws attention to the many cases of police misconduct, warning against becoming another statistic. The list of victims, disturbingly long.
“Late nights walking down the block
Gotta get home to your kid
Police pull you over
I pray to God they let you live
Don’t move. Don’t speak
…Handcuffs right around your wrist
You have nothing on you suspicious
Except your skin.”
Amid the mistrust, amid the violence, her message is defiant: “Black boy may you continue to rise. Black man continue changing lives.”
Slowly, Castillo is unchained and her demons exorcised. There is optimism, sensitivity, forgiveness.
In ‘Beautiful, Understanding, Determined. Dope – You,’ she writes, “What a blessing it is to have crossed our path during this lifetime. What a privilege it is to live you.”
And in ‘Progress,’ she asks, “What does love mean to you?”
Philosophically, Castillo explores atonement, gratitude and love of self.
“I am love,” she avers. “Unconditional at its purest form. I still love you. But I love me more
So-to my favorite broken heart, I am smiling like I have conquered something. Because I have.”
In similar vein, she concludes in ‘Untitled’, “I’m realizing I’m still wealthy in who I am. There’s richness in every breath given. You no longer get to do your healing at the expense of my soul.”
Remarkably, every offering in Castillo’s impressive debut follows a clearly defined trajectory toward wholeness.
For sure, Castillo is no longer bowed by the harsh terrain she once traversed. Her rebirth inspires.
‘This is for You’ takes us into the deepest recesses of human despair, but it allows us to revel in the exalted passions that only life can offer.

Feedback: glenvilleashby@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter: @glenvilleashby
This Is For You by Angel Castillo
© 2018 Angel Castillo
Publisher: Lulu Books
ISBN 978-0-359-16361-8
Available at Lulu.com
Ratings: Recommended

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