For me, sex is like writing a poem.

It takes me to some places I don't want to go, but it's always very illuminating and teaches me about my own needs and places that I need to work on.

This is death, sex, and money.

The show from WNYC about the things we think about a lot

and need to talk about more.

I'm Anna Sale.

Sandra Cisneros is one of America's most celebrated coming-of-age writers.

Her book, The House on Mango Street, about a young girl growing up in Chicago, is a staple in American classrooms and has been translated into more than 20 languages.

But I wanted to talk to Sandra Cisneros, not about adolescence, but a different life phase,

being in her 60s. A lot of her poems in her latest collection take place there. It's called Woman Without Shame. Sandra is now 67, and she began her 60s shamelessly when she organized her own party in the streets of the Mexican town where she now lives.

Well, I always wanted to jump out of a cake, and so I decided, well, it's my birthday, and I have to make things happen.

You know, if you have never had a birthday like the one you want, it's your fault because you haven't organized it.

So I organized a party in which everyone had to dress as pastry, and I wore a cake skirt, and we all went to to a restaurant and then we ran downtown to have

myriachi's serenade me, which is the best way to have a birthday, I think. And then we danced

with strangers in the kiosk because it was a dull night and people wanted to have something

happened. So when they saw people come into the square dressed as cakes, now that was just

drought.

So that's what I did for the 60th.

You describe a cake skirt, but the picture I saw, it really was a whole, almost looked like

a full body contraption.

You were a multi-layered cake.

Yes. It was made by a family that makes piñatas. Oh. almost look like a full-body contraption. You wear a multi-layered cake.

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