Poetry of Resistance ~ Odilia Galván Rodríguez
Odilia Galván Rodríguez, Poets Responding Admin.
Photo copyright © Claudia D. Hernández
Bridges v. Borders /
Puentes contra Fronteras
in another world
a border would be a bridge
crossing and answer
en otro mundo
una frontera sería un puente
atravesando una respuesta
Odilia Galván Ródriguez, at the invitation of Francisco X. Alarcón, along with other poets became a moderator of the Poets Responding to SB 1070 Facebook page early on. Odilia had worked with Francisco on other poetry collaborations since the 1980s when they met in Santa Cruz. She then became a member of Centro Chicano de Escritores with Alarcón and other Chicanx and Latinx poets and writers that used to meet in the Mission District of San Francisco. She continues to work with the Poets Responding project to this day and became its administrator at Francisco’s behest at the end of 2015.
Galván Rodríguez is the co-editor, along with Alarcón, of the groundbreaking and award-winning anthology Poetry of Resistance Voices for Social Justice, University of Arizona Press, 2016. The anthology came about as a result of the featured work of poets being voted on by the poet-moderator team of the Poets Responding to SB 1070 page, work which had been previously selected by them for features in La Bloga, a collaboration with Michael Sedano entitled On-Line Floricanto.
What follows are more poems Odilia has contributed over the first years of Poets Responding and a statement about her activist work with the group and Facebook page. ✿⊱╮
Borders/Fronteras
all kinds of borders
of empires
where we’ve needed
inherited new skins
to walk around in-
between
having to shapeshift
todo tipo de fronteras
de imperios
donde hemos necesitado
nuevas pieles heredadas
para poder caminar
por el medio
mientras cambiamos
de forma
DESTINIES
a bag
of seeds, of songs
Kokopelli, trickster
played his music in a desert
canyon
doomed words
we are full of
life wanting to spill out
on parched ground lusting for water
alive
with this
drumbeat I give
you back your heart, my heart
to dance back the clouds and rain ~ our
mission
a rock
can hurt or heal.
you ~ keep hurling through time
as though it has no tomorrows
to see
beneath
trees we made love
and more than fruit was born
a future we could not foretell -
our fate
Destinies appeared in ZYZZYVA Magazine
✿
I
want
to knock
down borders
... built in fear and hate
with these bare hands that birth poems
out of heart words flying in the wind with birds of peace
hate’s a dis-ease that makes people believe it’s okay to kill "other" people's children …
HANDS
we storm
the border between
here and there
the border
has been replaced
by people
holding hands
outstretched
a human chain
across the Southlands
our hands are joined
our hands holding
our hands sharing the power
from one palm to the next
a chain of energy
thousands of hands
held in hope
held in love
holding and sharing
in solidarity
for a new world
possible in positivity
in visions
of other realities
our hands
thousands
of our hands
red, yellow, black and white
hands
unmarked
undocumented
legal hands
just because they are human
hands
sending out a message
hands
sending out love
hands
saying basta ya!
hands
hands
holding
out the hate
hands
Poems are copyright © Odilia Galván Rodríguez. All rights reserved in all media.