Your daily dose of Chicano poetry
"I write poems on walls that crumble and fall
I talk to shadows that sleep and go away crying.”
Luis Omar Salinas (1937–2008)
José Hernández Díaz
Moroleón, Guanajuato; Summer 2010
I remember waking up to rooster cries
at my Abuelo’s house, d.e.p., my Abuela’s
house. I drank a lot the night before;
I ate a lot, traditional. The cobblestoned
streets were greyish-blue; The salmon clouds
had veered with dawn. On a white-plaster balcony,
I smoked a filter-less cigarette; $2.00 a pack in México.
Behind the cathedral’s bell tower, mesquite trees,
My father’s ranch. I took a drag, then two, exhale.
Q’ Viva Día De Los Muertos by Mateo Montoya
Q’ Viva Día De Los Muertos
Eres piel moreno, that cancion was da shit
Brown is beautiful except if you’re too brown inside or out
Besides I’m peddled vows that “I don’t see people in terms of color so sit”
I think to myself “ain’t that some bull shit,” so I shout
q’ viva día de los muertos
The living dead run the streets por la madrugada
preyed upon by the balla balla saving up for his Miata
Whatever happened to the boy who had no fada?
q’ viva día de los muertos
I drive the streets and think, “Oh what a man am I”
Ay there’s the rub… that’s some guy named Shakespeare
The rub… LOL… rubba dub dub I once was told they clean meth in a tub
Many rubs later I’d be reviled or revered for being an aztlan queer
q’ viva día de los muertos
The envious live their lives and cheat on their wives
vowing to chase the American dream; “Life is but a dream”
You’re feeling sleepy, the technocrat hypnotists prioritize our lives
Those oppressed in their waking lives dare not dream so they scream
q’ viva día de los muertos
I pray to El Santo Niño
with dirty thoughts of some vato named Nino
singing “I’m too sexii for this shirt.”
Scared?… then go to church while I do my dirt.
q’ viva día de los muertos
They stone me as a damned cultural Catholic
they stoned my pa a lazy no good spic
maybe what I need is an ol’ fashion ass kick
q’ viva día de los muertos
A life lived on one’s rodillas, says Pancho Villa, isn’t worth our time mi raza
still we mimic the powers that be and take our turn preaching del bully pulpit
shouting over the huddled bottom who whisper to one another, “Ain’t dat some bullshit?”
Slumbering nightmares and waking dreams of tamales q’ no son de pura masa
q’ viva día de los muertos
La Llorona del Longoria Affair haunts the vaulted halls of Yale so we yell
“LA LUCHA SIGUE, SIGUE!!! ZAPATA VIVE, VIVE!!!”
“Wait a cotton picking minute, all is well at Yale so please don’t yell.
P.S. you beaners smell,” dice el gringo guey.
q’ viva día de los muertos
Assimilation conquered away mis antepasados culture-of-poverty fears
neo-social Darwinists of today whisper sweet nothings in their ears
a sacred procession of hitos march hacia la pinta, violating rears
too many beers begets sixty years and tattood tears.
q’viva día de los muertos
Mateo Montoya is a Xicano originally from Cheyenne, WY, now living in Salt Lake. He “grew-up” in L.A., earned a B.A. in International Studies (Latin American focus), and currently researches patrilineal genealogy, urban education, philosophy of education, whiteness theory, post-colonial theory, semiotics, educational psychology and sociology of urban education –preparing him for further research on how hegemonic institutions disparately impact the socialization and racialization of urban youth of color. He blogs at http://xicanosblog.tumblr.com/
Mateo Montoya
Alliterations of Allegorical Authority
Microagressions of material existence
Transcend temporal transitions
Enlightening essences eloquently enunciate
Silenced by the semantics of solitude
Empowerment ensures emancipation
Treks through terrestrial transgressions
Poles of positionality pervade
Attempts of authenticity aggregate
Regrets of reification render
Vehement validation of versed voice
Resistance against racialized representations
Beauty buttressed by boisterous benevolence
Preemptively patronized by paternalism
Denigrated by dominance of deficit discourse
Warrants of western wizardry
Disgraced by daunting daemons
Ancestry of assimilations annihilate
Ethnic epistemological existentialism endures
Countless counter-narratives collide
Indentured ideologies of intent
Haunted houses of hierarchical hypocrisy
Impart imperial intelligences
The only in a family of three chavos to graduate H.S.. Mateo Montoya is currently pursuing an M.Ed. in Education, Culture and Society. His current academic research interests include urban education, philosophy of education, whiteness theory, post-colonial theory, semiotics, educational psychology and sociology of urban education — particularly, how hegemonic institutions disparately impact the socialization and racialization of urban youth of color through the many forms of whiteness and how that impacts racialized student’s academic- disposition, self-esteem/efficacy, performance, stratification, tracking and outcomes. Montoya was born in Cheyenne, WY and currently lives in Salt Lake. Visit his blog at xicanosblog.tumblr.com
Lillian Pittman
browngirl poem
Yeah, this small world
is cut loose by unlovingness.
It’s Abuelita knitting blankets
and us staying safe as we please,
or keeping no home at all
and mother proving her tenacity once more.
We can only pretend this is what it’s like
to be loved.
It’s learning in college
what they won’t let you teach,
or no education at all—
cutting us or coining us.
Nope, ain’t no different for browngirls neither.
It’s a fist like a hoof to the eye,
or a bullet in your heart.
Or it’s mama calling you “¡Pendeja!”
once the jackass is gone (before you know’t),
provin’ once more, she’s right.
It’s a doormat if you’re a Harriet,
(with or without an Ozzie) and no passion,
or passion and no commitment if you’re Ozzie himself.
Dye blond, get thin browngirl! Be a porn star,
stripper, used thing, just nothing lovely
—housekeeper, mule woman, river swimmer,
man eater, drug taker, baby popper,
cock teasing, husband pleasing browngirl.
You see, love’s the one thing you’re supposed to reserve
and save for another day, daydreams
sure, su madres y hijas,
yes, even your little boys that will grow
to be men with open hearts instead of closed fists
(just not other people).
Save it!
For your tomorrows—your next-times-Papi’s
—we’ll give love a shot.
Tequila Gold
with a slice of lime on the side.
¡Ban This! Anthology
Visit Broken Sword Publications for more info.
Xican@ Poetry Daily 