The poems from Security Questions (originally published as El pasado es un pueblo solitario) are, on the one hand, a lyric sequence shaped by the poet's coming of age in small-town Cuba during the late stages of Fidel Castro's regime, and on the other a testament of exile and immigration, traces that remain in the wake of forsaking a homeland for the uncertainties of the present. 

Each poem in this playful and trenchant collection unfolds as a reply to its title, and each title a question in English that echoes actual online prompts for newly arrived immigrants to establish official identity and security. With a mix of humor, irony, and sincerity, Morales transforms these absurd and interrogative bureaucratic authentication questions into the radiant poetry of a new 'American' persona.



Osdany Morales was born in Nueva Paz, Cuba. He is the author of the short story collections Minuciosas puertas estrechas and Antes de los aviones, the novels Papyrus and Zozobra, the genre-defying Lengua materna, and the poetry collection El pasado es un pueblo solitario. His work has received the 2006 David Award, a 2008 Casa de Teatro prize, and the 2012 Alejo Carpentier Award. In 2017, Dalkey Archive published the English translation of Papyrus as The Last Librarian.