LAPL Blog
luis j. rodriguez
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Let us dare haunting verse of the oppressed,
poems with hoodies, finger-tapping, ambling.
I mean pissed off and ardently expressed,
poems delirious as midnight rambling.
Bebop, Hip Hop, a decima or slam,
First, a number of greetings in the language of a few native peoples on this continent:
Yaa'teeh – “It is good” in Dine/Navajo
Kwira Va – “We are one” in Raramuri
Ideas of racial/cultural purity or superiority are alive and well in the United States. These are oppressive, non-biological, and unnatural concepts, pushed on us like other lies and illusions in our society. This wouldn’t matter much except people believe them.
In the aftermath of the Pulse nightclub massacre, Orlando, Florida, June 12, 2016
By Luis J. Rodriguez
Hate becomes death becomes hate.
The world unravels in fear.
Columbine: 13 students and a teacher gone.
On historic Central Avenue near East 45th Street, the Vernon Branch Public Library looks like a jail—tall fences surround the circa 1915 building and a fenced walkway leads up to the doorway. Like the surrounding neighborhood, the library appears worn, beaten down.
Crazy Horse
We hear what you say
One Earth one Mother
One does not sell the Earth
The people walk upon
Every road should come to this end:
A place called home.
When you don’t have one
the expanse of sky is your roof,
the vacant lots and sidewalks your living room.
Every city, your city.
In the United States, “Latinx Heritage Month” is celebrated from September 15 to October 15. This is a time to recognize and honor Latinx peoples, cultures, issues, contributions, and histories.
The calling came to me while I languished
in my room, while I whittled away my youth
in jail cells and damp barrio fields.
Chicano/a poets have emerged as major literary figures in the United States with the recent appointments of Juan Felipe Herrera as California Poet Laureate (although he just finished his two-year term) and <