Im the residue that sticks to the bottom of the melting pot
My culture is 7-11, winchells donuts and whatever lie Hollywood taught
I am born from five generations of stolen, displaced, evicted, despised & colonized – Taino, African, Roma, & Irish
Hidden under the wite-man’s blue eyes
Hated orphan Mama of color oppressed by kin
derivative eugenics within
gets wit my colonizer dad to birth the racist genocide
out of her skin
I am born. Raised on 7-11, Winchells donuts and corner Sto’s – Hollywood myths of family, wite-culture lies of happy
I don’t got no beans or rice, lumpia, tamales or collards, I don’t got no fireplace memories, or *capitalismas candies, I don’t got nothing except the .99 styrofoam cupped coffee.
I don’t got no loving aunties, tias, abuelas or sweet grandmas. It was just me and a very sad, depressed, disabled single Black/Indian mama.
Every year at this time, a terror would seep into my gut,
knowing what was ahead, how poor we were or how out of luck
A fake smile with our “free” turkey meal after a three hour line at a shelter. Handed out by nice wite people getting rid of their hoarded wealth guilt one day a year
A Capitalismas toy giveaway by an annoyed fireman or po’Lice officer who smiled at me now and put me in jail later
I aint gonna lie, this time makes me wanna die, sometimes makes me so sad I can’t even cry.
But I try
I try to change this all for my sun, teaching him and me bout all our stolen cultures- un-packing all the lies of our stolen traditions – holding my ancestors & creator and spirits close and never for granted.
And as I do-I Never forget the other parts of me, the broken peoples in my her-stories,
the alonenesses, pain, struggle that so many of us Po’ mamaz and daddyz alone feel, in silence in these times of so much fake colonizers lies about the African revolutionary called Jesus.
the comfort of- that 7-11 .99 coffee as it goes down my lonely throat, washing so much cold-ness and loneliness away until I feel nothing but mama’s love nestled in a free warm coat.
Capitalismas Def: Holiday created by capitalists who appropriated multiple pagan and indigenous celebrations and "changed" the birthdate of a revolutionary who cared for gente pobre (Jesus Christ) all in pursuit of consumer-based profits- (Created by tiny for the POOR Magazine colonizer language re-mix glossary 2007)