Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Poetry Friday: Ode to the DiaspoRican

Last week the Nuyorican Poets Cafe celebrated its 35th birthday. Literanista has clips of some of her favorite performers.

From Ode to the DiaspoRican (pa' mi gente) by Mariposa (María Teresa Fernández)

What does it mean to live in between
What does it take to realize
that being Boricua
is a state of mind
a state of heart
a state of soul…

¡Mira!

No nací en Puerto Rico.
Puerto Rico nacío en mi.

Read the rest at Boricua Poetry., or watch Mariposa perform below.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I love the "turn" in this poem, where she uses Mira! both as an attention-grabber and a shift to Spanish to make her final point. Thanks for sharing it.

Sarah Rettger said...

Back in college, this part of the poem was my e-mail signature for a while. And I'd almost forgotten about it until I read about the Nuyorican's 35th birthday - brings back many memories of my Caribbean lit class.