“Elena” is an example of the so-called persona poem, in which the speaker is a persona (a character) who is distinctly different and separate from the author. The text of such a poem represents that persona’s perspective and consists of their words or thoughts, which do not necessarily reflect the author’s point of view. This form is popular among poets who resist the idea of poetry as personal and confessional in nature. An early master of the genre was Robert Browning (1812-1889), whose collections Men and Women (1855) and Dramatis Personae (1864) include poems representing the views and words of a wide range of very different personas. Many of his poems take the form of a dramatic monologue, a sub-genre of the persona poem in which the words of the speaker are addressed to a specific listener who is a distinct character in the poem. This approach enables poets to explore the psychology and circumstances of people different from themselves.

Pat Mora has a distinct interest in persona poems, especially ones that give voice to women of Mexican heritage in the United States.