We are a different kind of refugee. Charco-crossers of a different exodus.
Hurricane María exposed the empire. She taught us, like nature, to reverdecer after the storm, sprouting, growing, flourishing again as a maximum expression of free, authentic life and purpose, versus responding to disasters, to injustice, with complacency, conformity and complicity.
I know, like that angler who carries her own linterna, that we Boricuas bring light through every damn apagón to the pit of the Puerto Rico Trench.
I leave you with this photo, also used for Episode 20 of the Podcast. Taken by my husband, that is us, crammed into the space between our refrigerator and stove, connecting our computers to that one power strip, plugged to about seven extensions running from our kitchen, down the side of our house, across our side patio, over the fence, across our neighbor’s side patio to their planta post-María.
...this year’s remembrance became sinister ceremony. Cast us back to that hurricane life of scarcity, lost lives, lost communities./ ...el recuerdo de este año se convirtió en una siniestra ceremonia de remembranza. Regresamos a esa vida de huracanada, de escasez, de vidas, comunidades perdidas.
Unused beneath empty pupitres of dark classrooms Unstrapped the mochilas to strap on mascarillas
I work to process the deep grief I hold for this Puerto Rico. The one that shakes every hour and waves, sways, pulses, taps, vibrates in between. I hold deep grief for the Puerto Rico of my mother’s dreams. The womb that held her when she was held in her own mother’s womb.
As she arrives a crescent moon, Venus and Jupiter anchor themselves in the sky, pulsing their light above the sunset. This is the hero’s welcome we receive when we uncross the journeys of ancestors.
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 the strange suspension of an altered state of consciousness to ascend/ escape from the superficial plane of outdated politics of injustice/ colonization/ climate destruction.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.
But for all the ways we have been controlled, all the ways we die at their hands, they still claim ownership over our own deaths. They don’t believe the numbers when the bodies are brown and black. They don’t believe us when we have lost hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands or millions. To do so would be to admit to the crime of genocide.
It is more profitable to keep people dependent on medications to suppress symptoms of illness than it is to heal them. Like battling illness, storm prep is big business. Home insurance industry is booming. The hiker/ back packer business went booming with Puerto Ricans stocking up on water filters, freeze-dried fruit, protein bars and solar supplies. Gasoline business is booming with all the generators we are running. Bottled water has become the hottest commodity. It is not in the best interest of the powers that be to address the climate change that has us living through these threats.
Rematriating Borikén 