Passionate Hispanic Poetry

1. Passionate Hispanic Poetry A lesson in cultural diversity

2. A Collection of Hispanic Poetry • The following is a growing collection of poetry that reflects both the passion, and experiences of Latinos in America. There is brief biographical information on each of the poets offered. This collection is a work in progress, and all contributions are welcome, whether it is something you have found, or something you have personally created. Please submit any new material to Ms. Sabo for consideration.

3. Poetry is more than you have been taught! • “We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. So medicine, law, business, engineering... these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love... these are what we stay alive for.” • “When you read, don't just consider what the author thinks, consider what you think.” • La Sociedad de los PoetasMuertos

4. The following CCSD Standards will be covered in this lesson: Prepare to organize Cornell notes for the day’s lesson: • RL.11-12.1 • Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain. • NV 3.12.5 • Evaluate the use and purpose of imagery, figurative language, and sound devices; analyze the author’s use of language and/or syntax. • NV 3.12.7 • Analyze the influence of historical events and culture on an author’s work.

5. Themes often found in Hispanic Poetry:

6. History of Mexican Immigrants to America:

7. Historical Context • When did the Hispanic community’s quest for justice begin? Their activism actually predates the 1960s. In the 1940s and ’50s, for example, Hispanics won two major legal victories. The first—Mendez v. Westminster Supreme Court—was a 1947 case that prohibited segregating Latino schoolchildren from white children. It proved to be an important predecessor to Brown v. Board of Education, in which the U.S. Supreme Court determined that a “separate but equal” policy in schools violated the Constitution. In 1954, the same year Brown appeared before the Supreme Court, Hispanics achieved another legal feat in Hernandez v. Texas. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that the Fourteenth Amendment guaranteed equal protection to all racial groups, not just blacks and whites. • In the 1960s and '70s, Hispanics not only pressed for equal rights, they began to question the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. This 1848 agreement ended the Mexican-American War and resulted in America acquiring territory from Mexico that currently comprises the Southwestern U. S. During the Civil Rights Era, Chicano radicals began to demand that the land be given to Mexican Americans, as they believed it constituted their ancestral homeland, also known as Aztlán .They argued the U.S.’s annexing of Mexican land in the 1800s was illegal.

8. Duality by Herman Sillas’ Art and Activism

9. Jimmy Santiago-Baca • Jimmy Santiago Baca was born in Santa Fe County, New Mexico, in 1952. Abandoned by his parents at the age of two, he lived with one of his grandmothers for several years before being placed in an orphanage. He wound up living on the streets, and at the age of twenty-one he was convicted on charges of drug possession and incarcerated. He served six and a half years in prison, three of them in isolation, and having expressed a desire to go to school (the guards considered this dangerous), he was for a time put in the same area of the prison with the inmates on death row before he was released.

11. Martin & Meditations on the South Valley • IV • Send me news Rafa • of the pack dogs sleeping • in wrecked cars in empty yards, • or los veteranos • dreaming in their whiskey bottles • on porches • of the past, full of glory and fear. • The black smell of wet earth • seeps into old leaning adobes, • and prowls like a black panther through open windows. • Austere-faced hombres • hoeing their jadines • de chile y maiz in the morning, • crush beer cans and stuff them in gunny sacks • and pedal on rusty bicycles • in the afternoon to the recycling scale, • and at Coco’s chante • at dusk tecatos se juntan, • la cocina jammed like the stick exchange lobby, • a los vatos raise their fingers • indicating cuantoquieren. • There is so much I miss Rafa, • so send me news.

12. XVII • I love the wind • when it blows through my barrio. • It hisses its snake love • down calles de polvo, • and cracks egg-shell skins • of abandoned homes. • Stray dogs find shelter • along the river, • where great cottonwoods rattle • like old covered wagons, • stuck in stagnant waterholes. • Days when the wind blows • full of sand and grit, • men and women make decisions • that change their whole lives. • Windy days in the barrio • give birth to divorce papers • and squalling separation. The wind tells us • what others refuse to tell us, • informing men and women of a secret, • that they move away to hide from.

14. IX • Eddie blew his head off • playing chicken • with his brother, Para proof • he was man, • he blew his head off. • Don’t toll the bell brother, • ‘cuz he was not religious. • The gray donkey he liked to talk to • at Dead Man’s Corner • grazes sadly. Eddie’s gone, its black-lashed dark eyes • mourn. His tio Manuel shatters a bottle • of La Copita wine against the adobe wall • where he and his compass drink every afternoon, • and Manuel weeps for Eddie. • “He was the kid without a coat • During the winter, ‘Member he stole • Those gloves? Nice gloves. • He gave ‘em to me ese.” • Blew his head off. • The explosion of the gun • was the golden flash of his voice • telling us no more, no more, no more. • His last bloody words • water the dried weeds • where his jefa threw the stucco fragments • out. Sparrows peck his brains outside • by fence posts.

15. Flaco said, “Don’t give him no eulogy! • He was for brothers and sisters • in struggle. You know I saw him • in court one day, when they handcuffed • his older brother to take his brother • to prison, you know Eddie jumped the • benches, and grabbed his brother’s • handcuffs, yelling, don’t take my brother • he is not a bad man!” • Everybody in Southside knew Eddie, • little Eddie, bad little Eddie. • He treated everybody with respect and honor. • With black-board classroom attention • he saw injustice, hanging out en lascalles, • sunrise ‘til sunset, with the bros and sisters. • Don’t ring the bell, brother. • Let it lie dead. • Let the heavy metal rust. • Let the rope fray and swing mutely • in the afternoon dust and wind. • How many times they beat you Eddie? • How many police clubs • are smeared with your blood, • Switch blade en bolsa, • manos de peidra, • ne la linea con suscarnales, • to absorb the tire-jack beating from other locotes, • billy-club beatings de la jura- • your blood Eddie spotted • sidewalks, • smeared shovel handles, • coated knife blades • blurred your eyes and painted your body • in a tribal-barrio dance • to set yourself free, • to know what was beyond the boundaries • you were born into.

17. from Healing Earthquakes: Poems by Santiago-Baca • A lover must liberate his lover, free her of lies to be • entirely • honest, • a lover’s heart must be a page-turner book filled with • familiar • feelings • of trust, dreams, • a lover’s mouth must fit her mouth like two fingerprints • perfectly • matched • in a crime of obsession for each other. • Two lovers bring the story to life • that resides in each other’s hearts, • and the living of those two stories lifts the two lovers • into • heights where only eagles fly, • fly over different-colored skin, • fly over different cultures, • fly over dark and brooding days, • fly both of them, • even when she is on stage and • dancing • she keeps him under her • wings… • and later when she is talking to someone, she says,Oh • yes, my love • or my husband, or my sweetness, in referring to • the other half of • her heart…

19. Pablo Neruda • A Chilean writer considered one of the most influential poets of the 20th century.. Chilean poet diplomat and politician; Nobel Prize for Literature 1971. Neruda became known as a poet while still a teenager. He wrote in a variety of styles including surrealist poems, historical epics, overtly political manifestos, a prose autobiography, and erotically-charged love poems such as the ones in his 1924 collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair. He often wrote in green ink, which was his personal symbol for desire and hope.

20. Sonetos de Amor • Sonnet 17 • I do not love you as if you were salt-rose or topaz, • or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off. • I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, • in secret, between the shadow and the soul. • I love you as the plant that never blooms • but carries in itself the light of hidden flower • thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance, • risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body. • I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. • I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride; • so I love you because I know no other way • than this: where I does not exist, nor you, • so close that your hand on my chest is my hand, • so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep. • Soneto17 • No tecomosifuerasrosa de sal, topacio • o fleche de clavelesquepropagan el fuego: • teamocomo se amanciertascosasoscuras, • secretamente, entre la sombra y el alma. • Teamocomo el plantaque no florece y lleva • dentro de si, escondida, la luzaquellasflores, • y gracias a tuamor vive oscuro en mi cuerpo • el apretado aroma queascendio de la tierra. • Teamo sin saber como, nicuando, ni de donde, • teamodirectamente sin problemasniorgullo: • asiteamoporque no se amar de otramanera. • sinoasi de estemodo en que no soy nieres, • tan cercaquetumanosobre mi pechoesmia, • tan cercaque se cierrantusojos con mi sueno.

21. Sonnet LXXXI • And now you’re mine. Rest with your dream in my • dream. • Love and pain and work should all sleep, now. • The night turns on its invisible wheels, • and you are pure beside me as a sleeping amber. • No one else, Love, will sleep in my dreams. You will go, • we will go together, over the waters of time. • No one else will travel through the shadows with me, • only you, evergreen, ever sun, ever moon. • Your hands have already opened their delicate fists • and let their soft drifting signs drop away; • your eyes closed like two gray wings, and I move • after following the folding water you carry, that carries • one away. The night, the world, the wind spin out their destiny, • Without you, I am your dream, only that, and that is all. • Soneto LXXXI • Y a eresmia. Reposa con tusueno en mi sueno, • Amor, dolor, trabajos, deben dormer ahora. • Gira la nochesobresus invisibles ruedas • y junto a mi erespuracomo el ambardormido. • Ninguna mas, amor, dormira con missuenos. • Iras, iremosjuntosporlasaguas del tiempo. • Ningunaviajarapor la sombracinmigo, • solo tu, siempreviva, siempre sol, siempreluna. • Yatusmanosabrieron los punosdelicados, • y dejarencaersuavessignos sin rumbo, • tusojos se cerraroncomo dos alas grises, • mientrasyosigo el aguaquellevas y me lleva: • la noche, el mundo, el vientodevanansudestino, • y ya no soy sin ti sino solo tusueno.

22. Sandra Cisneros: • Sandra Cisneros (born December 20, 1954 in Chicago) is a United States author and poet best known for her novel The House on Mango Street. She is also the author of Caramelo, published by Knopf in 2002. Much of her writing is influenced by her Mexican-American heritage.

23. Cloud by: Sandra Cisneros • If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. • -ThichNhatHanh • Before you became a cloud, you were an ocean, roiled and • murmuring like a mouth. You were the shadows of a cloud cross- • ing over a field of tulips . You were the tears of a man who cried • into a plaid handkerchief. You were the sky without a hat. Your • heart puffed and flowered like sheets drying on a line. • And when you were a tree, you listened to the trees and the tree • things trees told you. You were the wind in the wheels of a red • bicycle. You were the spidery Mariatattooed on the hairless arm • of a boy in dowtown Houston. You were the rain rolling off the • waxy leaves of a magnolia tree. A lock of straw-colored hair • wedged between the mottled pages of a Victor Hugo novel. A • crescent of soap. A spider the color of a fingernail. The black nets • beneath the sea of olive trees. A skein of blue wool. A tea saucer • wrapped in newspaper . An empty cracker tin. A bowl of blueber- • ries in heavy cream. White wine in a green-stemmed glass . • And when you opened your wings to wind, across the punched- • tin sky above a prison courtyard, those condemned to death and • those condemned to life watched how smooth and sweet a white • cloud glides.

24. Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales • Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzáles (June 30, 1928 – April 12, 2005) was a Mexican American boxer, poet, and political activist. He convened the first-ever Chicano youth conference in March 1969, which was attended by many future Chicano activists and artists. The conference also promulgated the Plan Espiritual de Aztlán, a manifesto demanding self-determination for Chicanos. As an early figure of the movement for the equal rights of Mexican Americans, he is often considered one of the founders of the Chicano Movement.

25. From "I am Joaquin"By Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales • I am Joaquin, • Lost in a world of confusion, • Caught up in a whirl of a gringo society, • Confused by the rules, Scorned by attitudes, • Suppressed by manipulations, And destroyed by modern society. • My fathers have lost the economic battle and won the struggle of cultural survival. • And now! I must choose between the paradox of • Victory of the spirit, despite physical hunger • Or • to exist in the grasp of American social neurosis, • sterilization of the soul, and a full stomach. • YES, • I have come a long way to nowhere, Unwillingly dragged by that • monstrous, technical industrial giant called • Progress and Anglo success... • I look at myself. I watch my brothers. • I shed tears of sorrow. • I sow seeds of hate. • I withdraw to the safety within the • Circle of life... • MY OWN PEOPLE

26. I am Cuauhtemoc, • Proud and Noble Leader of men, King of an empire, • civilized beyond the dreams of the Gachupin Cortez, • Who also is the blood, the image of myself. • I am the Maya Prince. • I am Netzahualcoyotl, • Great leader of the Chichimecas. • I am the sword and flame of Cortez the despot. • And • I am the Eagle and Serpent of the Aztec civilization. • I owned the land as far as the eye could see under the crown of Spain, • and I toiled on my earth and gave my Indian sweat and blood for the Spanish master, • Who ruled with tyranny over man and beast and all that he could trample • But... • THE GROUND WAS MINE. • I was both tyrant and slave. • As Christian church took its place in God's good name, • to take and use my Virgin strength and Trusting faith, • The priests both good and bad, took • But • gave a lasting truth that • Spaniard, Indian, Mestizo • Were all God's children • And from these words grew men who prayed and fought • for their own worth as human beings, for that • GOLDEN MOMENT • Of • FREEDOM.

27. I am Joaquin. • I rode with Pancho Villa, crude and warm. • A tornado at full strength, nourished and inspired by the passion and the fire of all his earth, people. • I am Emillano Zapata. • "This Land This Earth Is OURS" • The Villages • The Mountains • The Streams • belong to Zapatistas. • Our life • Or yours is the only trade for soft brown earth and maiz. • All of which is our reward, A creed that formed a constitution for all who dare live free! • "This land is ours... Father, I give it back to you. • Mexico must be free..." • I ride with Revolutionists • against myself. • I am Rural Course and brutal, • I am the mountain Indian, superior over all. • The thundering hoof beats are my horses. • The chattering of machine guns' • are death to all of me: • Yaqui • Tarahumara • Chamula • Zapotec • Mestizo • Espanol

28. Activities: • You will be divided into groups of up to 4, and given the poem selection in hand-out form. Next, your group will choose one of the poems from the selection, and discuss the following questions. Write your responses on a separate sheet of paper with all group member names. Be prepared to read the poem to the class, and support your answers with textual evidence!

29. Questions: What do you think the poem means… • Who or what is the subject of the poem? • What are they talking about? • Why do you think the author wrote the poem? • Where is the poem happening? • What is the poet’s attitude? • Identify the theme (central idea) of the poem.

30. Assessment: • As an individual, your notes will be graded for completion ??/20 pts • Your group will be graded on presentation of the poem, as well as the answers to those questions. Always use textual evidence to support your answers, and explain how the textual evidence supports your answers. • ??/30 pts • Total: ??/50 pts