mexican jazz 148

 

waiting for the snake skin to shed

we become the overall song that our mothers and fathers sang

they bled their names on this earth

with hands and feet and backs

and sweat

this mexico. this nuevo mexico.

this colonized land. whose native tongues

are drifting. getting stuck in dried cedar branches

pancho villa’s peoples came through here and devasted

indigenous land. devasted indigenas. raped and pillaged

indigenous blood. yaqui blood. tarumara . pueblo.

mexican hands pillaging their own red peoples

mexican hands full of red tainted blood.

we have killed over and over. each other.

brothers on top of brothers

killing and raping mothers and sisters

lost in this colonization

forgetting the blood trails before

anasazi . and other temples

rushed through all our bloods

migrating trails

migrating visions of where we have been

where we are going.

we cannot forget

how many times we have burned each other

we can never forget

the mud and blood on our hands

we have to wipe them clean

and build from here.

mexican jazz part 147 b

along the frontera the buried bodies

get buried under the undocumented sun

undocumented desert

these bones disappear

operation watergate

these uncles, fathers mothers, sons and daughter

bleed out the thirst

in the coldest of heats

in the buried shoes

buried parts of clothes

the buried dreams

mexican centro american

bones                     disappear

dreams             fade into the sand

bodies of the american landscape

 

mexican jazz part 146b

growing up mexican american in east los angeles

you forget sometimes that there are bigger racisms

in the world. or that the racisms are not part of the norm

its a complicated border cultura that comes in waves

whenever we crossed the border of east los angeles and

into monterey park. there was a very likely chance

that we were going to get pulled over. most definitely

told we fit the description of the vehicle they were looking for

but you get used to it. you get used to the harassment of getting

out of the car. whether it was a cadillac, honda, saab, toyota

it didn’t matter. you just so happened to always be inside the vehicle

they were looking for. but you don’t fight against it. you don’t say

anything . partly of course because you don’t want to make things

worse. but partly because you feel like. its annoying. and part of your life

nobody tells you this isn’t normal behavior. because its the normal

behavior we were used to facing in the barrio.

http://www.chicanocoloringbooks.com

photo credit image

kristy lovich

words by

israel haros

mexican jazz part 145b

we make list that honor our memory and honor

the flesh and bone of the arrow we are putting out

 

  1. mexican burrito jazz with salsa from an abuela who loves tito puente
  2. mexican apocalypse in the middle of sunday tacos
  3. we become the hunger for social justice
  4. Mexican Monarch Butterfly Warriors
  5. Stone Tongue Song Interlude
  6. Olmeca Cadence
  7. From Traumara to Almost Dissapeared
  8. The Walking Tonatiuh
  9. The Bleeding Coyoxauhqui
  10. To be Continued #Mexicanjazz

http://www.chicanocoloringbooks.com

 

mexican jazz part 144 b

todos cruzamos la frontera

de la alma que nos espera

con la libertad de nuestras

manos adentro de la pacha mama

abriendo las partes de nuestra memoria

que puede recordar abrir al alma y las alas

en los ojos

 

2

we are the breaking light

migrating across queztalcoatl

taking the parts of the ocean

that are from the womb where we came

from taking the parts of the sand

that mirror who i really am

taking apart the deception

that somehow I’m separate

from anything

 

mexican jazz part 142 b

there are the spaces where our tongues collapse on themselves

and we start to forget our jewish heritage our irish heritage

our japanese or mexican heritage and start to try and just claim american

its easier to pronounce

its easier to make excuses

 

its easier than to actually try to explain all the layered truths

of your barrio. all the inconsistencies. all the fallen hopes

all the places where you watch the concrete spill your cultura

all the ways it gets left behind when no one is looking

when everyone one is silencing in advertantly

 

we are these border immigrant migrant dream

echoing across generations of being scapegoated

of being put into concentration camps

detention centers and all the places inbetween

the border of our history

the borders of our tongues

the borders of our memory

 

waiting to put down the wall

 

http://www.chicanocolorinbooks.com

 

 

mexican jazz part 141 b

we were the ones waiting at the border

waiting for our mother to return

from the setting sun that almost took her life

from the coyote that took my sisters life

from the breath of life

we came to become

 

in this america

we  were the ones waiting at the border

trying to find the border patrol officer

so he could tell us where to go

to be safe again.

 

he asked why we came here

he told us we were not his problem

and that we should go back to where we came from

that if it was up to him. he would make sure

all these centro americans all these mexicans

would just stay over there

 

he told us

you are not our problem

you need to ask your government to fix your problems

 

but he never even bother to here

why we were here

what we were running from

because back home

 

nobody does anything about the problemas

nobody can stop them

nobody can make them stop killing

nobody can make them stop threatening

nobody can make my home

my home again

 

so i don’t think he knows what he’s talking about

or maybe he does know but he doesn’t want to admit

it

maybe he knows how bad

it is for us back home

where there is no home anymore

but he just doesn’t want to say it

because we’re not his problem.

 

http://www.chicanocoloringbooks.com

 

 

mexican jazz part 140 b

this border breaks us and binds us

it speaks to us in tongues

we are waiting for the salvation of where we come from

we are waiting for somebody to tear one down

or build another one up

or to rescue refugees or detain them or make them disappear

this immigration song of us

this border song of us

we are the breaking apart of this border paradigm

somewhere in there

remembering that we are this precious chaos

this precious chaos born 2016 born 1999 born 1848

born inside 1493 born inside every salem witch trial

born inside every native hung, every african slave hung

every irish and mexican hung. every japanese american interned

we are this burning tongue

waiting for the water to remind us

we will be borderless again

we will be skinless again

we wil be again

http://www.chicanocoloringbooks.com