Broken Solider

Putting the pieces to a broken solider...
We sit and talk in the midst of the morning light...
We laugh and sigh...an awkward pause,


He tells me how happy he is...
then he stares blankly into the sky.....


The tears,
The pain,
The sorrow...


A broken solider....is left with a tainted soul.

MUJERES VALENCIA

Mujeres
Sobrevientes
mothers...
daugthers...
Lovers....
Sweet listeners of the sky.....
We are Las Mujeres Valencia....
take on other names , tittles, identities....
Renounce conventional upbringings....
selfishly and passionately...manifest our inner desires......
we strive and press on....

Abusive.....submissive....
unwed wives and mothers....scandalized temptresses....
alchoholics...
curanderas and pious Santas........

My mothers and I.

.................................................................................................................................................

Mujeres
Sobrevientes
Madres
Hijas
Amantes
Dulcemente eschucamos el cielo
Somas las mujeres VALENCIA
Tomamos otros nombres, titulos, identidades
Renunciamos ensienansas traditionales
Egoistamente e apassionadamente ....manifestamos nuestros deseos
Luchamos y continuamos........

Abusadoras,
sumissas
Esposas y madres sin casamiento....temptadores escandalosas
Alcholicas...
Curanderas.... y religiousas santas

Mis madres y yo...

A Well Behaved Woman Doesn't Make History

As I lay in the stillness of my bed
My heart methodically beats and yearns to know?

Who will she be when she grows up?
Does growing up ever stop?

Desperately trying to subdue to everyone’s wishes
She looses herself in an abysmal of mayhem

Distraught and distressed are her symptoms.....

How will you tell them?
How will you let them know?

I am not who you think I am nor will I ever be!

She wants to fly.

“Quiere volar”


Compressed
Reduced to subdue
Confined to a man
She yearns for freedom

To dance
To touch
To feel

Only in a way someone would know how to do if.........

She fell
She cried
Felt hopeless



Failed, failed again....failed better

Virgen Mary in the Flesh

Dios te salve, María, llena eres de gracia, el Señor es contigo.

Teresa del nino Jesus Barrios is the daughter of Galdina Valencia. Teresa del nino Jesus was born and raised in Cuyuca de Catalan, Mexico; a place where food is scarce and education non- existent. Teresa, the eldest daughter of eight children was forced by her own mother to prostitute herself in order to help sustain the family. She was beaten everyday of her life by her mother and mother’s lovers out of desperation, poverty and brutal ignorance.

Bendita tú eres entre todas las mujeres,

y bendito es el fruto de tu vientre, Jesús.

Patricia Barrios is her fake name; her new identity in the United States. Crossed the Rio Grande, endangering her life. At the mercy of the Unforgiving Sun who devours people, their spirits and aspirations for a better life. She is a single mother of three who works two jobs to give her children a better opportunity in life. She sacrifices her own personal happiness, works religiously; loves her children dearly. The youngest child is the product of a lover affair. A love affair in which for the very first time she felt what love truly was. Patricia makes no apologies for falling in love. She works devotedly. She is well loved and respected for her generosity and honesty. Everyone knows her as “la comadre paty.” La Comadre Patty drinks her worries away. She is an alcoholic for the next twenty years.

Santa María, Madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros, pecadores,


Mi Mami is like no other. Mi mami is not perfect. Mi Mami has an ill fated past of faith and redemption, perseverance and self determination.

Teresa del Nino Jesus, Patricia and the infamous Comadre Patty is.........

My Mother
My Father
My Virgin Mary
Who gave her all for the sake of Others
The one who taught me, “que el quierer es poder!”


ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte. Amen

I Don't Know

To not see anything, not even a future with you, makes me question why I hold onto you. It is a fatal attraction that drives me to shrug away my womanly pride. It is your deep and mysterious eyes that make me want to caress and take care of you, not knowing where I will go or what I will do. I often say, he something to not worry about.

But I know....

That every time I push him away, I love him more and more, and every time I shout, “I hate you!” I want to indulge in his everlasting scent that permeates my soul.
I do not claim to know what I would with or without you
I am smothered in a constant battle of “I love you” but “I really don’t know”

Its not knowing and wanting more....
Its tasting how good it could be...

I don’t know and I don’t want to know....
I don’t care and don’t hope to care.....
I don’t love you... but I really do.........

The Object of Every Man's Desire

The perfect location with the best tasting food, warm smiles and beautiful women. Gorgeous women blessed with charismatic smiles, petite bodies and the omen of being every man’s sexual desire. Old men, fat men with pepperoni nipples, married men coming on business trips, men not blessed with the same luck back home- come to Thailand. The people are extremely hospitable making sure that spoiled foreigners are catered to their every need. Who would blame the locals: necessity talks? Made slaves on their own island, forces to succumb to overnight resorts that replace what was once their native home. They are made workers of these extravagant resorts rather then the free spirits that they were born to be. Most natives will never be able to afford one night in these luxurious hotels and settle for being spectators while foreigners reap the benefits that Thailand has to offer: its rich culture, food, natural resources and more importantly the hospitality of their women.

Beautiful little girls at the ripe age of sixteen, destined to be good at quietly sitting next to a rich man, taking whatever she can get, eating whatever is given to her by him- eating the crumbs that he sprinkles onto her, and laughing when he laughs, as not to upset him. Who are these women and what went wrong? Why do they eat the petty food that he offers them as if it were gourmet? Why do they shut up, when he lifts his finger and signs…shhhhhh!

Yang and Tu Baozi

Caught in a city… stuck between a paradox of yang and tu boazi,[1] I stumble to find the menial significance of life. I am trapped in a world that I no longer belong to. I am afraid to go home. The people that life revolved around while growing up and in high school are not the people that I strive to be. Some of those people will never know what its like to live outside of the parameters of Highland Park. Most of them made an attempt to go to a community college, within a year drop out, get a minimum wage job working from 9 to 5, day in and day out-creating a vicious cycle. Why?

I am afraid to go back home and not want to ever return. My good old Highland Park has molded me into who I am today. It wasn’t until I came to China that I realized the endless possibilities that lie ahead of me. I don’t want be stuck or settle when there is so much to do and see in life. I don’t want to spend my evenings drinking outside my front porch, as so many of my neighbors do. I don’t want to be another statistic.

However, the people who I once thought to be part of me, questioned my very desire to excel in life, “so what now Zuhey… do you think you’re better than us!” are the words that torment my soul. Do I just settle… and fit into the norm? Do I go on with myself and continue to forget my past and look simply ahead? “One must know their past in order to move forward,” are word so often said but how can some who is stuck between a paradox of yang and tu baozi move forward?



[1] Terms used in classical Chinese literature. Tu baozi are people who do not aspire for anything in life- they are content with living a menial existence of mediocrity. The term Yang refers to people who strive to know more in life- who seek enlightenment.

Dear Beloved

Dear Beloved,

I know this may be too much to ask for but I’m so confused and scared to be outside; always sleepy and anxious, you see- Prozac dumped me. Consumed by technology and yet still stuck in the past. Always searching and never content. Maybe I should introduce myself to Zoloft, I heard he’s hot. Remember when I was the lover of all lovers? When you promised you wouldn't leave me- now look at me?

I can’t find Peace? Have you seen her? I was in search for Spiritual Quest but apparently I missed the cut off and besides her prices were too high. I can’t seem to find an outlet, do you have one? Even if I find Sleep, tell her that when I wake- everything that I fled from is still there. But only this time it’s a day later- another battle, another chronic back ache that just won't go away.

Rescheduling

I live by thee

Escaping, running, hiding......

Let me be

Sincerely,
Wendy Warstricken