Half-Mexican - Juan Felipe Herrera

[Larry Robinson]

Half-Mexican

Odd to be a half-Mexican, let me put it this way
I am Mexican + Mexican, then there’s the question of the half
To say Mexican without the half, well it means another thing
One could say only Mexican
Then think of pyramids – obsidian flaw, flame etchings, goddesses with
Flayed visages claw feet & skulls as belts – these are not Mexican
They are existences, that is to say
Slavery, sinew, hearts shredded sacrifices for the continuum
Quarks & galaxies, the cosmic milk that flows into trees
Then darkness
What is the other – yes
It is Mexican too, yet it is formless, it is speckled with particles
European pieces? To say colony or power is incorrect
Better to think of Kant in his tiny room
Shuffling in his black socks seeking out the notion of time
Or Einstein re-working the erroneous equation
Concerning the way light bends – all this has to do with
The half, the half-thing when you are a half-being
Time
Light
How they stalk you & how you beseech them
All this becomes your life-long project, that is
You are Mexican. One half Mexican the other half
Mexican, then the half against itself.

	- Juan Felipe Herrera

Juan Felipe Herrera is America's new Poet Laureate:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/10/books/juan-felipe-herrera-of-california-to-be-next-poet-laureate.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/poetrylovers/attachments/20150611/043d61fb/attachment.html>