“I meant to write a book about Eros
And I met me instead.”
— Jo
Eros Despite is an evocative collection of poetry that begins with a search for romantic love and becomes something far more profound—a journey toward the self.
What began as an exploration of desire gradually unfolded into an unexpected pilgrimage inward. As Jo Guzman followed the language of eros through love and longing, memory, heartbreak, beauty, and hope, she discovered that every search for another was, in some way, a search for herself.
Written with lyrical elegance and emotional honesty, these poems explore love in its many forms—passionate and tender, intoxicating and heartbreaking, sacred and ordinary. Along the way, eros reveals itself as more than romantic passion alone. It becomes the force that draws us toward beauty, truth, intimacy, creativity, and ultimately, the self.
Moving through themes of love, loss, sensuality, healing, and renewal, Eros Despite invites readers into the terrain where the heart follows desire wherever it leads. It gently asks what remains when longing strips away illusion, revealing that our search for another often becomes the path back to our own heart.
Both intimate and universal, Eros Despite is a collection for anyone who has loved deeply, lost courageously, questioned their own worth, or found themselves unexpectedly transformed by love. It is an invitation to linger in the beautiful contradictions of being human and to discover that perhaps the greatest love story is not the one we seek, but the one that leads us home to ourselves.
