Summary Of 'Elena' By Pat Mora

The word communion in the sense of the sharing of thoughts and feelings is not always necessarily spiritual in nature, but also mental exchanges as well. Pat Mora uses this sharing of the intimate thoughts and feelings or communion in her poems. In the poem “Elena” the speaker is describing feeling alienated from her family in the time of their communion as they sit at the kitchen table for dinner, due to her inability to speak English. This can be seen in the lines “At night they sit around the kitchen table, laugh with one another. I stand by the stove and feel dumb, alone.” In Mora’s poem “Gentle Communion” the speaker describes a time when she could sit and commune with her grandmother. The act of sitting in her grandmother’s chair would