We are a different kind of refugee. Charco-crossers of a different exodus.
No matter the flags, the berets and formations, or the “red, black and green jumpsuits”, the revolution won’t be televised. And if too many of us forgot, even more of us never knew. It is my belief we are asking to much from a venue never designed to give it. We are wanting too much from people not equipped to offer it, but it is ok to hold them accountable, and ourselves accountable too.
Hurriquake= 1. the strange suspension of an altered state of consciousness to ascend/ escape from the superficial plane of outdated politics of injustice/ colonization/ climate destruction. 2. Sandwiched suspended or trapped between rumbling skies of tropical storms and the earth rumbling beneath your feet.
This is the kind of epic shit that only eclipses and cosmic currents bring. The revolution went down and is going down. The best part (or worst for some) is that none of us who dreamed about it or worked towards it for decades can take credit. That’s the beauty. Liberation is a practice and a praxis. You don’t vote for it. No empire can grant it. There is no trophy or prize that you get to cash in on in the end. There’s not even an end. Just a beginning and the process.
Vulnerability in bravery means pushing forward with all your wounds, gripping a shovel tight with bloody hands, digging past the mud to find the spaces and hearts where our ancestral ways thrive, where new liberatory ways are being weaved into existence./ Vulnerabilidad en valentía significa seguir palante con todas las heridas, agarrando la pala, manos ensangrentadas, excavando la tierra para encontrar los espacios y los corazones en donde nuestras tradiciones ancestrales prosperan, donde se tejen nuevas existencias libertas.
Not knowing, not honoring our history is hella dangerous territory. It leaves us celebrating the heroes and tenets of our colonizers, while stomping on the graves of our own. It is not dollars we are needing, but dignity.
We the colonized work to decolonize ourselves, then turn on one another from wounds too vulnerable, too raw to bear. We lash out at one another. The enemy is too far, too inaccessible. We realize. In shame, we retreat.
It is time to focus on the colonial classroom, the empire’s primary battleground. The threat goes beyond school closures. It includes the continued attack on the one public university system in Puerto Rico. It is embodied by a white North American secretary of education with an inflated salary, while her school children constituents are sacrificed at the austerity table of odious debt. It resounds in the arresting, pepper spraying and tear gassing of people protesting injustices like these. Ultimately the colonial battle is waged daily on the minds and on the psyches of the colonized, with schools cunningly crafted for the conformity and conditioning of the colonial subject.
My broken body colonized Was the space of incubation In which I myself Had to craft and manifest their liberation Through it I could envision doing the same for myself
I know emotional labor. Though we perfect it, it is not a trait exclusive to women, nor do all women possess the capacity for it. I watched my brother die from fucking emotional labor! I have watched men mother more effectively than some women. If we are to eradicate patriarchy, we must stop appropriating and wielding patriarchal weapons in our fight.
The colony was formerly on life support with enough real estate, restaurants, casinos and electric lights to mask its reality. It was kept breathing by a machine so that when the lights went out, it would signal the end. The lights have been out for 7 months.
The art of darkness is the spreading of invincibility like smoke rising from el fogón. In essence, like celestial bodies in outer space, darkness cultivates visibility, which would make it not a tool of, but a weapon against colonialism.
Charco-crossers like myself arrive at a space where we feel divided: our bodies on one side, hearts and spirits in another. Our home on one side, work on the other. Many of us have either lived on each side or travel and work extensively on both sides. Others adhere to one side only, adopting and... Continue Reading →
"...you be colonial man You done be slave man before They done release you now But you never release yourself" -lyrics from "Colonial Mentality" by Nigerian musician Fela Anikulapo Kuti My people are yet to be released. We are three times colonized: by Spain, by the United States and by our own selves. Colonialism is... Continue Reading →
On January 6th, Three Kings Day here in Puerto Rico, I received a gift via email. It was an invitation from Occupy Museums to participate in their Debt Fair Project, a collective installation as part of the 2017 Whitney Biennial. 10 of us were invited specifically to represent the case of the debt crisis in... Continue Reading →
Yo creo en muchas cosas que no he visto y ustedes también, lo sé No se puede negar la existencia de algo palpado por más etereo que sea no hace falta exhibir una prueba de decencia de aquello que es tan verdadero el unico gesto es creer o no. algunas veces hasta creer llorando se... Continue Reading →
Rematriating Borikén 