Native Tongue
by Amelia Alvarado
Faculty Advisor Swift Dickison
(The Red Jacket. Montgomery College, Rockville, 2004. 68-69.)
My shame is not what I have done in my past
My shame is not that "ive told my life to people who bash me
With every word that comes out of their mouth
My shame lies in not knowing my native tongue.
The vocabulary is limited and can fit in a small box
The syllables come out like drops of water;
Not like the river that flows when I speak English.
My culture is lost here in Maryland, but thrives as always
In my native homeland.
I hear the drumbeats in the distance, whispering my name
And asking me remember;
To remember the time when I only knew her and spoke of her
When English was the stranger I haven't met,
And Spanish was the breast and milk that suckled me.
Spanish held me in her arms,
Wrapped me around like a tortilla
And English stayed at arms length.
Spanish knew every curve of my body,
And English only had the privilege to look from afar.
Spanish praised my hips and legs,
Then English came and said, "you're much too curvy,
you're better off dead!"
With each passing year, as the cactus sun rose and fell,
English came out ahead, and held my native tongue in
chains.
"Don't speak Spanish in the classroom,"
It would say.
Kept her in a tower and had the intention to take my attention,
Away from her in order to get to forget about her,
But she kept on singing my name,
Asking me not to forget her
To speak of her and learn what we lost.
To remember the days when my friends were only mis
amigas.
And my mom was mi madre
To remember the days when I would stay up late
And watch Sabado Gigante on the Spanish channel
And make comments like a grown-up, cuz I knew what I
was talking about.
When my language was considered beautiful and not
something to hide,
Not something to despise.
When café con leche was enough, not that pinche so
called coffee from Starbucks
Back in the days when my name was Amelia Cristina
Alvarado,
Not "oh, like Ameila Earnhart!"
No, Amelia like my grandmother.
I remember my Native Tongue
Me requerdo de ti.
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