What distinguishes Sandra Cisneros's poetry is also what makes categorizing it problematic. The sometimes rather flat, unadorned diction and the earthy explorations into the nature of desire seem, at first glance, to position the work squarely within the realm of American feminist poets and artists who privilege the role of experience in recentering and validating women's perspectives and ways of knowing. The first impression that one has of this work is that it is highly realistic, and that it applies techniques of naturalism and verisimilitude.

However, in Loose Woman realism is simply a reference point. What is occurring within the poems is much more complex and psychologically charged. Cisneros probes the extremes of perceptions and negotiates the boundary regions that define the self and the systems of knowledge required in constructing a notion of identity. This requires extraordinary skill, because Cisneros flatly refuses to utilize the techniques of other writers who were interested in uncovering the archetypal depths of human consciousness. Although she is concerned with the erotic, Cisneros does not utilize the rarefied, allusion-filled forms of the French symbolists. Neither does she approach the erotic in a manner that defines it by invoking the transcendent in the manner of Whitman or the Beats.

Instead, Cisneros utilizes wry, pungent observations and extended metaphors in order to set up parallels between the phenomenal world and the mind. In doing so, she ironizes and satirizes those who will not acknowledge the multiplicities of identity and the subversive, deconstructing potential which resides within the most seemingly straightforward of identities. Perhaps her most riveting poems are the ones which construct a parallel between menstrual blood and male (not female) identity. In “Down There” Cisneros lovingly details the characteristics of menstrual blood in a manner which echoes the Mexican poets who have written about the miraculous qualities of semen: “I'd like to mention my rag time. / Gelatinous. Steamy / and lovely to the light to look at / like a good glass of burgundy. Suddenly / I'm an artist each month. / This star inside this like a ruby.” In Cisneros's hands menstrual blood takes on the attributes of semen, but adds even more, since it is blood, and filled with all the symbolic implications. This extends the intertextuality of the piece, and includes Octavio Paz's well-known work, El laberinto de la soledad, which deals with the importance of blood and earthiness in the Mexican male psyche. In one swift move, Cisneros appropriates (or reappropriates) icons of masculinity and engenders them female. The result is anarchic, funny, earthy, and absolutely affirming to all notions of female creative energy.

For Cisneros, an experience-based epistemology requires a heightened awareness of the textures, colors, and physical sensations of the world. It also asks of the reader a certain willingness to consider assuming a mask, or a persona, for the duration of the poem. By being willing to merge one's identity with that of the persona (the various aspects of the “loose woman”), the reader gains the opportunity to celebrate the diversity of human experience and to participate in the reconfiguration of identity.