unharm someone by telling the truth you could not face when you struck instead of tended.— put the fire out (unburn)
listen to my poems. but do not look for me. look for you.— you
i don't pay attention to the world ending. it has ended for me many times and began again the morning.
when you are struggling in your writing (art). it usually means you are hearing one thing. but writing (creating) another.— honest¦ risk
I.Although Tía Miriam boasted she discoveredat least half a dozen uses for peanut butter—topping for guava shells in syrup,butter substitute for Cuban toast,hair conditioner and relaxer—Mamá never knew what to makeof the monthly five-pound jarshanded out by the immigration departmentuntil my friend, Jeff, mentioned jelly.II.There was always pork though,for every birthday and wedding,whole ones on Christmas and New Year’s Eve,even on Thanksgiving day—pork,fried, broiled, or crispy skin roasted—as well as cauldrons of black beans,fried plantain chips, and yuca con mojito.These items required a special visitto Antonio’s Mercado on the corner of Eighth Streetwhere men in guayaberas stood in senateblaming Kennedy for everything—“Ese hijo de puta!”the bile of Cuban coffee and cigar residuefilling the creases of their wrinkled lips;clinging to one another’s lies of lost wealth,ashamed and empty as hollow trees.III.By seven I had grown suspicious—we were still here.Overheard conversations about returninghad grown wistful and less frequent.I spoke English; my parents didn’t.We didn’t live in a two-story housewith a maid or a wood-panel station wagonnor vacation camping in Colorado.None of the girls had hair of gold;none of my brothers or cousinswere named Greg, Peter, or Marcia;we were not the Brady Bunch.None of the black and white characterson Donna Reed or on the Dick Van Dyke Showwere named Guadalupe, Lázaro, or Mercedes.Patty Duke’s family wasn’t like us either—they didn’t have pork on Thanksgiving,they ate turkey with cranberry sauce;they didn’t have yuca, they had yamslike the dittos of Pilgrims I colored in class.IV.A week before ThanksgivingI explained to my abuelitaabout the Indians and the Mayflower,how Lincoln set the slaves free;I explained to my parents aboutthe purple mountain’s majesty,“one if by land, two if by sea,”the cherry tree, the tea party,the amber waves of grain,the “masses yearning to be free,”liberty and justice for all, untilfinally they agreed:this Thanksgiving we would have turkey,as well as pork.V.Abuelita prepared the poor fowlas if committing an act of treason,faking her enthusiasm for my sake.Mamá set a frozen pumpkin pie in the ovenand prepared candied yams following instructionsI translated from the marshmallow bag.The table was arrayed with gladiolas,the plattered turkey loomed at the centeron plastic silver from Woolworth’s.Everyone sat in green velvet chairswe had upholstered with clear vinyl,except Tío Carlos and Toti, seatedin the folding chairs from the Salvation Army.I uttered a bilingual blessingand the turkey was passed aroundlike a game of Russian Roulette.“DRY,” Tío Berto complained, and proceededto drown the lean slices with pork fat drippingsand cranberry jelly—“esa mierda roja,” he called it.Faces fell when Mamá presented her ochre pie—pumpkin was a home remedy for ulcers, not a dessert.Tía María made three rounds of Cuban coffeethen Abuelo and Pepe cleared the living room furniture,put on a Celia Cruz LP and the entire familybegan to merengue over the linoleum of our apartment,sweating rum and coffee until they remembered—it was 1970 and 46 degrees—in América.After repositioning the furniture,an appropriate darkness filled the room.Tío Berto was the last to leave.
When I heard the learn’d astronomer,When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself,In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.
in my younger yearsbefore i learnedblack people aren’tsuppose to dreami wanted to bea raeletand say “dr o wn d in my youn tears”or “tal kin bout tal kin bout”or marjorie hendricks and grindall up against the micand scream“baaaaaby nightanddaybaaaaaby nightandday”then as i grew and maturedi became more sensibleand decided i wouldsettle downand just becomea sweet inspiration
For Detroit
There are birds here,so many birds hereis what I was trying to saywhen they said those birds were metaphorsfor what is trappedbetween buildingsand buildings. No.The birds are hereto root around for breadthe girl’s hands tearand toss like confetti. No,I don’t mean the bread is torn like cotton,I said confetti, and nonot the confettia tank can make of a building.I mean the confettia boy can’t stop smiling aboutand no his smile isn’t muchlike a skeleton at all. And nohis neighborhood is not like a war zone.I am trying to sayhis neighborhoodis as tattered and featheredas anything else,as shadow pierced by sunand light partedby shadow-dance as anything else,but they won’t stop sayinghow lovely the ruins,how ruined the lovelychildren must be in that birdless city.
I Celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Out of the night that covers me,Black as the pit from pole to pole,I thank whatever gods may beFor my unconquerable soul.In the fell clutch of circumstanceI have not winced nor cried aloud.Under the bludgeonings of chanceMy head is bloody, but unbowed.Beyond this place of wrath and tearsLooms but the Horror of the shade,And yet the menace of the yearsFinds and shall find me unafraid.It matters not how strait the gate,How charged with punishments the scroll,I am the master of my fate,I am the captain of my soul.
By: Emily Dickinson
‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –
And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard –
And sore must be the storm –
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm –
I’ve heard it in the chillest land –
And on the strangest Sea –
Yet – never – in Extremity,
It asked a crumb – of me.
