poetic turn:' "Lower east side poem"

The 'poetic turn' is the moment in which a poem takes the reader by surprise and fundamentally shifts the reader's perspective of the poem. This is seen in Miguel Pinero's "Lower east side poem" which takes a conventional poetic subject -- death and life after death -- and celebrates the poet's desire to embrace seemingly negative and immoral aspects of New York City. Instead of repenting the error of his ways and seeking peace from a life of hustling and drug dealing, Pinero's poem turns all of these conventions on their heads and instead begs the reader to ensure that he can enjoy all of these things, even after death.

The poem begins with a vision of the author standing on a tenement building, dreaming of his death and seeing a vision of his ashes scattered across New York. The refrain of the poem...
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