Hijo de Mi Alma
There is a sadness though that runs an ocean deep
within. Had almost spanned that
much too, when she had no map to the treasure
of arms crossed in embrace over a
cultural divide.
She misses something, an old friend, talking story
over café in the afternoon, her
motherland, Puerto Rico, Isla del Encanto. She’s left with memorias por
montones.
Misses her childhood, forced to leave by a bootstrapped father.
The Bronx. Oakland. L.A. Pittsburg.
Every year, at the bus rodeo for East Co Co County,
she’s asked what her one wish is,
and she states, “I want to go back to Puerto
Rico”.
She sees in her boy a pitirre, calling her from an ocean
span away. An island so
sweet, dulce de ajonjolí. And he wishes he could be,
bajando del monte, su canto de
jíbaro.
Boy Toys
When I was mocoso I played with muscle men
luchadores
two inch figures of molded plastic opened my imagination
Often I played the lead role
el tio who
had just returned from the war
big brother
Tres Flores pomade slick hair and the fly ride
vato de
aquellos who everybody respected and no one crossed
There was a story I often reenacted
young man
has a daughter
daughter
teaches young man
how to be
BIO
Freddy Gutierrez, vato de aquellos, residing
in Oakland, California. Freddy is pursing an MFA in Creative Writing
from Mills College where he was awarded the Community Poetics
Assistantship. He is also a Teaching Artist in the fields of poetry and
theatre teaching K-12 and university students, and in the local jails
and juvenile halls; and at San Quentin State Penitentiary. The bulk of
his poetic creations have been performative in that the works have gone
from the page to the stage and the street. Freddy’s read and performed
at Galería de la Raza in San Francisco’s Mission District, La Peña
Cultural Center in Berkeley, The Ashby Stage also in Berkeley, UC
Berkeley, UC Davis, San Francisco State, Sacramento State, San Francisco
City College and other colleges and universities throughout Northern
California, as well as, to support many of the local social protests,
rallies, and direct actions for campaigns concerned with immigration
rights, housing and tenant rights, indigenous rights, and the
criminalization of youth of color. He’s published poems with POOR
Magazine, {m}aganda Magazine, and Poemas Insurgentes.