#rebeccariverapoetry

[rebeccariveraa]

This photo is from a shoot I did with a friend (@Jadebiggavel on IG) back in 2016. I wrote some prose inspired by both the photos and the song “Ride” by Lana del Rey (which I couldn’t stop listening to at the time) that I will share in the next two posts. The following lyrics that open up the song are what inspired me in particular : “When the people I used to know found out what I had been doing, how I’d been living, they asked me why - but there’s no use in talking to people who have a home. They have no idea what it’s like to seek safety in other people - for home to be wherever you lay your head.”  Post 1/3. 

Ride - Rebecca Rivera

[rebeccariveraa]

"We should speak Spanish more often," I tell you as we sit in the back of a New York City cab. We are both bilingual, but navigate English with more fluency. That is usually how the story goes. First-generation American. Vehicle for dreams. Inheritor of a special kind of loss. Anyway, I feel obligated to bridge the distance between our home and that of our parents, so I say, “verdad?” and you agree. You wonder why I ask this of us now. To speak in a language we have both neglected. And I could tell you that the current presidency has vilified our people to the point where I am often more numb than not; to the point where I have no tears to offer and purposely scroll through the news too fast to avoid testing this theory; that speaking Spanish is my own kind of protest. But really, it's because I've binge-watched Narcos. Don't laugh. It's true. We're not Colombian, and obviously not drug lords, but we are still Latino after all and that is enough for me. I mean Quica could be my cousin, probably. And Tata has all my tias’ dark hair. And despite all the men being incredibly horrible, they all laugh like my uncles. So you see, it's kind of a Hollywood miracle. The best part is, there is no American-English dub over their voices, just subtitles at the bottom of the screen trying to translate their singing Spanish. The more they speak, the more it sounds like music. “I want to speak more Spanish because I want us to always sound like we're singing; because the translations aren’t always accurate and I want to live honestly; because if the world wants to know what I am saying they will have to actually listen; because if I inherit anything it should be another language to understand you in.” I don't say this aloud, just in my head. But you know me and I do not have to translate what I mean into sound. I just say, "we should speak Spanish more often, verdad?" and you agree.

Narcos | Rebecca Rivera

[rebeccariveraa]

“I was a loner for most of my life - at least in my head. I felt as unstable as my thoughts; always changing; always racing off to somewhere else, unable to stay still. I was a wanderer inside of myself. A sufferer of my own delusions. And there was noise. There was always so much noise. Then he came and saw me, and I saw him. It’s dangerous to be seen as clearly as we saw each other. It was the kind of interaction that made everything else feel meaningless. He came and he made the noise stop. He came and he made me feel real, less alone. It was all I ever wanted.”  (2/3) 

Ride - Rebecca Rivera 

Photo cred: Jade Biggavel (@jadebiggavel on IG) 

[rebeccariveraa]

"is there a hurt?    and if so    is it killed at the origin?   do all Honduran boys move as fast as you?   you have a good eye has anyone told you that lately?    can I see your hands?    I don’t mean to pry   I just wonder what you silence the wound with

Inquiries for the boy inside my father | Rebecca Rivera

[rebeccariveraa]

I leave my home And call it an exodus Historically, I have always been in a state of migration. Constant, To allow my feet enough time to negotiate my existence with the earth. I think: If i plant myself in enough cities, I cannot be washed out of them all. I think: If I coat enough tongues with my Spanish, this country will call me back home. To stop before this has been granted Would be to succumb to a history of dying nameless Like Juan Seguin, Once proud Tejano Who after fighting alongside fresh faced Anglos And leading them to victory in what is now known as the Alamo Was then chased out of Mexico, now America And died a stranger to his own land Died unsung and forgotten And I cannot be a mirror to that kind of unhonorable fate To be told I do not belong where I have been firmly planted I want to have endless roots, Gripping the earth Something to trace a lineage with. I want to swallow enough water to soak you up Or wash you out Before your English thinks itself brave enough to whitewash me Out of every history textbook. Rebecca - the fact that I know my name is its own revolution. But it is not enough Say: Juan Seguin - 1836. hero of the Alamo Say: Octaviano Larrazolo - 1928. first Latino elected to the U.S. senate Say: Ensign Manuel Gonzalez - 1941. pilot & one of the first American casualties at the attack on Pearl Harbor Say: Half-a million Latinos fighting in WW2 and then coming back home to a country with “No Mexicans” signs hanging in front of their restaurant doors. Say: Us fighting anyway. Say: Us thriving anyway. Say we have always been here. Calling this home. Calling this resistance. Writing ourselves back into the narrative. Giving our children a history they will not have to rip themselves open to find. Showing them their roots Showing them we have always been here Saying: we have always been here. we have always been here We have always Been here

Self-portrait as a lost Latino history | Rebecca Rivera

[rebeccariveraa]

“We took turns being the wild one” is a quote from the novel How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents by Julia Alvarez about three sisters from the Dominican Republic who come-of-age and navigate their experiences adjusting to life in the United States. In the novel, Julia used this line to describe the way each sister took turns misbehaving and being “wild” throughout their adolescence. Though this poem is about a romantic relationship and not sisterhood, it still reminded me of how often relationships are a sort of dance. A daily give and take. We mirror each other and then respond accordingly. It’s true, We took turns being the wild one. We took turns loving and hating each other. We took turns creating worlds we could survive in by morning then burning them down at night. Sometimes drunk, sometimes sober. Sometimes in front of an audience, sometimes in front of no other witnesses but ourselves. 

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People say you never really know someone until you live together, so… I try to see the ways in which our love would change if we inhabited the same space If i’d wake to your dimpled smile and pull you closer in my sleep If we’d lay there until we could no longer ignore our desire to witness the way the sun spills into our room How it is so comfortable with the seeing of things And i try to see a life of netflix nights Of kidney beans and cauliflower rice Of cleaning up the mess we made while sipping on vodka sodas with a slice of the limes we keep around for our homemade drinks and taco nights. And I see the safety. The never needing to say goodbye for too long. I see you in all your wicked charm leaving to meet a client, then me following you to the door. And i try to see what i’d see when i catch my face in the mirror on the way back inside. And I squint. Look to see if everything is in the same place. If there are signs of wrinkles or any noticeable hint of loss. Something I could’ve left in-between the turning of the sheets. Something like seconds, or the minutes I would have spent laughing elsewhere. What i mean is, somedays i wonder if I will wake feeling I have missed a train.     a meeting.     a flight.    [a life.] Something that is not real, but could have been.

Rebecca Rivera

[rebeccariveraa]

Sandra Cisneros, Pixar's Coco, and Latinx representation

 Let’s talk about representation, but first, navigation. As in, I have only ever navigated and existed in this world as a women of color (WoC), more specifically, as a Latina. And everything within this identity that I have come to view as a blessing was once its own set of wounds, inherited or otherwise. When I say “inherited wounds”, I mean that women of color either know or come to know that this world was not built for us to thrive in (see racism, sexism, and all of it’s intersections) . And this knowledge is passed down or born into us. It is inherited. And then becomes a truth you cannot separate us from. You cannot separate me from my struggle without erasing a vital part of who I am. But that is understood by those I allow into my life. Now, if you do not know me too well, then here are the basics: 

I am a Latina WoC. I am an artist. I have big dreams. Many goals. No blueprint. And very little representation in the fields I wish to break into. All of these smaller truths have molded my bigger, more personal one which is that - 

I have had to carve out and fight for the space I occupy. I have had to dig deep and coach my now booming voice out of its body. I have had to seek out my own mentors, role-models, and inspirations who looked like me and navigated the world in a similar way. And mostly, I have grown up impatient and starving for representation. 

One way I actively heal and seek out representation is by consciously consuming and surrounding myself with art, films, media, literature, podcasts, and all content produced by women, PoC, and mostly Latinxs. This month it has looked like this: 

I’m not sure why Sandra Cisneros didn’t come into my life sooner being that she is one of the most prominent Latinx writers of our time, but I’m glad I was able to sit down with her words. There is an indescribably comforting feeling that comes with knowing that someone who shares the same name as your mother, has a father with a voice like yours, shares part of your history, can love in the same two languages you can, can easily pass for one of your tia’s, and dreams the way you do, has already accomplished so much. And it’s not that you ever need permission to be great, but reading her books felt like a silent permission. 

These books provided a mirror and a temporary home for me. An excerpt from A House of My Own illustrates why perfectly. Cisneros writes, "We find ourselves at home, or homing, in books that allow us to become more ourselves. Home 'is not just the place where you were born,' as the traveler Pico Iyer once noted. 'It's the place where you become yourself.'"

part 2 in this month’s healing looked like this:

Before going to see Pixar’s newest box-office hit “Coco”, I was warned not to wear my signature winged eye-liner to the theater. Two on-screen duets and several wet tissues later, I was glad I had adhered to that advice.

If after my previous spiel about representation and navigating the world as a Latina/WoC you are still wondering what warranted such a teary-eyed response (besides the fact that Pixar endlessly loves to pluck at the heart strings of their audience) I want you to picture this:

A young Latina woman with the goal of one day becoming a successful actress goes to the cinema and for the first time in her twenty-two years of living is watching an animated film in which the characters look like her uncles, and cousins, and aunts. For the first time she can point to the screen and say, “that is me”, “that is us”. And in this way, watching “Coco” felt like coming home; like walking into a room full of the people I love and belong to, but who are rarely ever celebrated - especially in such a public way.

I went to see this movie with my boyfriend and nine-year-old sister. Being able to take her to see this film was another victory in itself (on par with being able to take her to see Wonder Woman). I had to wait twenty-two years to see this kind of representation in film; one that is both authentic and empowering. But my sister is still in the midst of her childhood; still being molded and shaped into the person she will become later in life, and I hope that holding these mirrors up to her this early on in her development will prevent her from inheriting the wounds I have had to fight daily to heal myself from.

And so, in the midst of all the tears, the melancholic sounds of guitar strings strong enough to conjure my grandfather’s face, and holding the hands of my younger sister- a silent way of saying, “can you believe it, Sofie? He (the protagonist) has our last name?” a part of my younger, more broken self was healed and for that I am endlessly grateful.

[rebeccariveraa]

2AM Thoughts

1. Everyone says to write about what scares you & I guess that makes sense because that’s when you’re your most honest, but that is also like giving your enemies/opponents/the world a list of all of your weaknesses & the different ways to defeat you. 

2. I mean, I guess if you’re a writer, it is also a strength. People like people they can relate to. We’re all vulnerable, some of us just solidify it in a novel, or send it out into cyberspace for all the world to see. 

3. I never feel like I am doing enough. 

4.  I love poetry & meeting new people at slams, events, competitions, but hate feeling disconnected from them as soon as the poem is over. We can share our deepest secrets with one another for an uninterrupted 3 minutes, but can barely get past 2 minutes of small talk without using the same compliment twice & smiling viciously at each other while scanning for the nearest exit. 

5. Liquor helps. 

6. I just want to connect. 

7. There is so much reading to do. I wish I could just touch a book & absorb all of the knowledge. 

8. There are different kinds of romantic love. Some make you feel safe, loved, & appreciated. Others are so intense that every messy emotion inside of you demands to be felt. These are the most addicting. It doesn’t matter if the love is healthy or not.

9. No one wants a lukewarm kind of love. But no singular person should have that much power over you either. 

10. I wonder which kind of love you think we are. 

11. I’ve been trying to write a poem that captures the feeling you get when you look at a photograph that isn’t yours, but feel like you were there anyway. Like you can transport back to some October in 1997 just by looking at it. Or lean in & feel the cool wind in your hair & hear the rock song that was probably playing. I’ve been trying to write this poem forever. I have written several versions, but nothing comes close to the feeling. It’s the most frustrating thing ever. I would live in that feeling if I could. 

12. That’s why we do drugs, anyway. For the feeling. To experience something outside of ourselves. 

13. If nostalgia was a person, I’d definitely make out with them. 

14.  I know I am talented & dream big & am pursing my goals, but whenever people undoubtedly believe in me I’m like...”LOL OK. You obv don’t know me very well or do not know many people who ACTUALLY work hard & are amazing.” It’s horrible. I’m working on it. 

15. I feel better when people who have accomplished a lot are older than me because it gives me time to catch up. Like, “oh ok cool. This person is 25. I can totally accomplish that by then.” 

16. Nothing is sacred. Meaning the closer you get to your dreams; the closer of a behind-the-scenes look you get, the more the magic fades. People are still people & they are still petty & image is still important & not everyone is your friend. The magic is in the art itself, rarely in the people. 

17. Once in a while though you do meet amazing, genuine souls & that is worth holding onto. 

18. I want to dive headfirst into Latino-American history & then hand out flyers on every street corner & train station with all the contributions we have made to American society that most people don’t know about. Facts like: “Did you know half-a-million Latinos fought in WW2?” OR “Did you know that David Bowie’s song ‘Fame’ was partly composed by the Puerto Rican guitarist Carlos Alomar?” 

19. I used to categorize people by how much emotion & logic I’d think they’d have. I know humans are COMPLEX or whatever, but I still think this is a pretty reliable way to see how compatible you are with others & at least have a grasp on their way of thinking. 

20. Even though the manic-pixie dream girl trope is problematic, I secretly like the idea of someone seeing me as their artsy dream girl. Is it weird that some of the first times I related to women in film was through the MPDG trope? Because I DO shit like walk in the forest & listen to the score of the 2003 Peter Pan film to evoke FEELINGS & reflect on life. BUT I AM THE MAIN CHARACTER OF MY STORY, OK? 

[rebeccariveraa]

I tried to write about my mother  and her Spanish tongue how it would say  'la pereza es madre de la desgracia'  like it knows being tired is a privilege  I tried to write of lineage  of all the women giving  how after Spanish  it is the language they are most fluent in  'ten un poquito de amor un poquito de paciencia  un poquita de todo que te puedo dar  sin darte todo lo que tengo' I tried to write about that instead, I am writing about us again How when I say I love you  what I mean is  I am tired  of giving  How some nights this feels like taking  and I am not fluent in that yet.

Mother tongue | Rebecca Rivera

[rebeccariveraa]

I have no interest in voluntarily partaking in anything that does not consider me. I don’t want to read books that do not consider me. I don’t want to watch films or tv shows that do not consider me. I don’t want to listen to podcasts or go to see plays that do not consider me. 

I want only this: to see myself reflected everywhere. To look up from a book and see the faces of my aunts in strangers, then look back down and hear their booming laughter rising from the ink. I want to go to the cinema and watch my sister fall in love on-screen and not have her be wearing a skimpy red dress while doing it. I want to hear our stories on NPR. The bad and good ones, too; the stories of neighborhoods gone, but not forgotten because they are burned into the memories of our uncles, and cousins, and women who look like our mothers but aren’t. Women who sing songs in Spanish and always find a window to look out of. I want to learn of the battle cries, of the blood shed, of all the men and women with brown and glistening skin - not just of the sound of my own howl; the way it rushes to empty me of my sadness. The way it begs the moon for all our buried names. 

[rebeccariveraa]

Maybe I will always

1. fluctuate between confidence and self-consciousness. 

2. be bored of anything as soon as I deem it ordinary. 

3. be running out of time. 

4. hate a poem 10 minutes after I write it. 

5. want to live in my head more often than not. 

6. wonder whose heart aches like mine and want to hold their hand. 

7. not give a shit what anyone thinks. 

8. give a shit what everyone thinks. 

9. be fighting to write Latinos into existence. 

10. be fueled by the undying need to see myself reflected everywhere. 

11. cry myself into a new life. 

12. be an anxious kid at heart. 

[rebeccariveraa]

some selfies from the first ever FEMSlam in Cambridge, MA this past weekend. Our team Femmeyc made it to finals!