Author: Art of the Commune | Arte de la comuna
-
A net of creation stories
Dust, mud, clouds, rainforests, volcanoes: each one is a relationship to my elders and the battle for life of my ancestors, willing to be present and leaving us to our own sun. The belly-button of the moon: Waves over oceans and lakes, wind rattling trees, lifting wings: lunar serpents gliding across all our bodies, the…
-
The longest moment
I give my self permission to be.I have nothing better to do than to be my self.My body is cartography of the longest walkhills, rivers, mountains, canyons, plains, caverns, cisterns, aquifers a constellation-filled net for lungs and a volcano for a heartMy feet are calloused by the moon’s sandpaper lightMy hands are instruments of god’s…
-
Original World
OUR ANIMALSdance with usdance to the invaders musicpara burlarse de sus notas y ritmos[to make fun of their notes and rhythms]We hear their musicand our hearts and mouths destroy their harmonieswith the windwith the waterwith the soil and her dusty laughterYou may never understandour pitcheshow we squeal the songsstrike our bones to start the fireshow…
-
Ransom Notes | Day 1 April Poetry Month Chapbook
Identity Who among us is a beastthat never dies?Who among us is a loverthat never cries?Who among us is a dreamerthat always lies?I am your woundI am your eyesI am your bed (I am your shadowthat runs acrossthe groundand no obstacle, no rockno chasm, no mountainscan keep me from being at your feet) {1 April…
-
White Swan | Toppenish, Rolling Hills | Story
In 1948, maybe 1953, certain earlier, my brother Gilberto, when he was a 11 or 12 year old member of our migrant farmworker family that had travelled north and landed in Yakama lands to work the land, met White Swan. White Swan was then old, very old, deep in the winter season of his life.…
-
Day Four 2019 | The cellphone baby
The cellphone baby criesbewildered by human voicesUnsteady in our armsThe cellphone screen filled with rhythmic red ocean wavesand a toenail moon calms her for a breath or twoHer skinher hearingher sighther touchher hairher bodyis wirelessher ancestors are blockedher father is in jailher mother needs a breakher grandfather disappeared years agoand her grandmother holds her tightcomforts…
-
Day 3 2019 | My houses have been left in smoke
The air is dyingThe wind has become a banner bloodied with carbon monoxideEveryone is in awe of their beautiful sunset/sunrise photographsHumans are flat and believe the earth is tooThe sun sends messages and warningsAnd we take photographs.The electricity company did not start the firesWe did.everyone is a little predator-consumer:we flick the switch, we press the…
-
Tonantzin | Coatlicue | Guadalupe
Today is not 12/12 Whose calendar, whose history, whose story? Today, tonight and the day and night after and before that, for all eternity swinging, gyrating and twirling around the sun, is the time to remember where we are: in the time and space of coatlicue, tonantzin, pteskawin or whatever you may call mesoamerica/america-centeredness: guadalupe,…
-
Moo! Moo! Moovement! What is good for cows?
Moo moo moovment! Good for cows! (Improvisations with the Good for Cows duet, Devin Hoff & Ches Smith — circa 1996) Moomooomooo mooovement! no more corporate flesh eating no mo’ cowpokes no more INS roundups no more buckaroos No more Marlboro he-men moo moo mooovement! no more brandings no more mad cows no more lassos…
-
Born in the wrong world
I was born in the wrong worldI was born at the wrong timeIn my world you could peer into the watersSo clear that you could seeall the way to the other sideof the universethe constellations curving around youin a big bang hugI was born into the wrong worldIn my world you could scoop up the…
Welcome to La comuna: ART OF THE COMMUNE 