BIO
Cindy AnaCaona Peralta, barriga jarta, formerly known as Black Angel es una escritora Afro-descendiente desde la República Dominicana. Born in NYC and raised with a foot in each country, she’s an oral storyteller since birth and writing since the age of 13. As a former member of several poetry troupes, she has toured NYC schools and facilitated workshops to encourage poetry and creative writing amongst inner city youth. Sharing words at prison facilities, including Eastern Correctional Facility and Riker’s Island, she’s a griot who champions change. Her style is said to be brutally honest and shedding light where lies proliferate, unafraid of controversy and striving to shock her audience into realizing the truths that she has come to understand are unavoidable. She has been published in two performative anthologies Mujeres, The Magic, The Movement and The Muse, as well as Thinking In Full Color, both written entirely by women of color. She is also Director of Community Outreach for the non-profit organization Bronx Bound Books. A mobile bookstore providing fee or low cost books and services to the community most in need. When not writing and being a mother to two incredible young scholars, she can be found procrastinating on social media via Facebook (facebook.com/blackangeldapoet) or Instagram (@anacaona514) Pa’ q’ lo sepa
Mi gente del Caribe
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta
Oye esa clave
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta
El ritmo de nuestra sangre
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta
Conga sounds making rounds
Forging down African veins
Plowing paths, middle passaging their way
Through misty caribeno plains
Ancestros still vividly live
In caramelo tones, wide hips, small waist
Thick lips, high cheekbones
Roiling every kinky coil
Entwining our DNA
Reminding me of my Afro Taina heritage
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta
How can I ever forget?
Hija de Oshun siempre sere
Encendiendo fuego ha tu lena
“Cuidado con ese machetazo de lengua”
Mama used to tell me
Bisabuela indigena to my story
Vicious slave ships wandering aimlessly
Rigorously beating waves aqua marine
Didn’t begin our true history
Napoleon colonialism made sure you never see,
Hear or read about me
Faded Columbus silenced blood written pages
Feigned padre of civilization
Hidden behind true savagery
Conquering what was once thought too African pagan
In the name of Christian murderous glory
Stealing what we once gave away for free
Now we fast forward centuries
Tousaint L’Overture’s slave revolt overture
Freeing the country partially
But today you wouldn’t even believe
That it took place, as race identity gets erased
As though we don’t have any traces in our face
Couldn’t play in the sun too long
Or I’d look like an Haitianita
Dios te salva if you relished
being a Dominican negrita
Ebony skin transpired decades
of Trujillo white washing
la fiesta del chivo
Forgetting Hermanas Mirabal
original beauty
But me? I always wanted to be black
So black that I wanted to erase
Spaniard traitorous hate,
In my grandmother’s pale face
Every time she glared at me
My unnatural locs maliciously reminding her
Espana ojos claro y pelo rubio lacio
was a bland flavor to be
My sazon a bit too much for her indentured palette
My soul too rich for her broken civilized standards
I am la revolucion, sin confucion,
A toda condicion, by any means necessary
Taking back oppressed destroyed languages
Coerced submissions birthed AnaCaona in the flesh for this mission
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta
Abran paso, make way for the sage
Tabaco y ron
Bembe’s, bomba plena, merengue y son
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta
This will never be televised on Univision
La Revolucion
Coming soon to an island near you
*pa pa tunco ta ta ta