Yvonne Chen
I.
We spent one night listening to eleven baring open their souls
Though the stories might belong to others
It made no difference because they had
Internalized them and made them their own
First we welcomed Sebastian
Who’d been collecting his thoughts for eleven months
After his mom passed away
He wanted to share the last part of his 3-stage work
When he paused abruptly we knew why
We encouraged him with solemn finger snaps
Crystal wanted a man to conquer her castle
But still treat her like a princess
Her legs would be
Another twin towers he wanted to shove planes through
She also railed against the three men who wouldn’t pay for dinner dates
She wanted chivalry, chivalry
Ladies first and
Chivalry, chivalry
June found Lucy jaded by love
July found her heart wanting a captor again
August found her trapped, unable to leave, unwilling to leave
September found maybe she wanted someone new
Sammy taught us a new game
Rock paper scissors shoot
Rock paper scissors
Shoot
Where childhood games mirror life in the hood
Where dodgeball is dodging bullets
Where freeze is yelled by schoolchildren playing tag
And also by cops in pursuit
Manuela told us about obstacles while
Jorge answered the question:
Would you rather cheat
Or be cheated on?
(he chose the former)
With his sister in the audience, Westmore performed
Baring his inner self like an open book, admitting to traits
At times flippant
Like his lack of commitment to one pair of shoes
At times serious
Like his refusal to buy a diamond ring for a future bride
Because he would not pay their blood price
Bryan spoke an open letter to the man he first loved
His absent father
At age 10 his grandmother had to teach him how to throw a baseball
II.
El grito de poetas
Sang forth from four mouths
One was a social studies teacher
(you could also tell from his historical verses)
Whose conversational speech
Fell naturally into the lull of spoken word rhythms
If only my professors lectured like that
Two waltzed in speaking of
Passionate, romantic, sensual
Salsa
And how Latin dances broke segregation barriers in USA
An accessible universal language of bodies; bailando!
And then about the passionate, romantic, sensual
Primal roots of language which
He equated to primal, passionate, romantic lovemaking
Three, I must admit it was hard to catch his gist
But he crackled on stage like a thunderbolt or firecracker
Sparkling and alive with raw emotion
Dig, he said, dig to reclaim your heritage
Because it has been passed down
On an etch a sketch
From shaky hand
To shaky hand
Four brought us to tears
Of laughter
With lists of ethnic stereotypes
I’m not Mexican because my head isn’t big
I’m lying my head is pretty big
I don’t have six kids
Only four, I’m working on the other two
Then we were touched by
Words of advice to a dear daughter
Don’t let five dollar men fool you with twenty dollar words
My dear
If he says he would rearrange the alphabet to put u and i side by side
Tell him, that sounds German
I don’t do German
A duet poem followed,
The wordsmith teacher and firecracker man
On the universal truth:
I’m only human
We’re only human
Finally all four lined up on stage
One by one they came forward as a mouthpiece
For their ethnic heritages
Each a pastor with a congregation of three murmuring their assent
Who knew his message so well they could echo him
At the conclusion of it all
They do this because, they say,
Latinos need to know
That there are people who look like them doing poetry
That they have a voice
