Canción de Las Flores
The latina women that I think of Are the ones fertilizing the soil
Voices muffled in dirt
Skirts found teared
Next to petals watered by a mother’s tears Every father’s fear
To lose a baby girl to lust
When lust goes left
Turned eulogy
Femicide has never been a fabrication Bodies never found
Families still looking
Praying and hoping
To find a limb
Something
anything to bury
A hint of closure
To rest their worn out hearts.
Restless souls
Yearning to go home
The beauty that the world praises
Hidden in rivers and lakes
Why do you think our flowers are so beautiful? Lovers turned to seeds
To feed our biodiversity
Ever growing
As they live on
Only to be picked and plucked
By the same selfish hands
Who were never taught to leave a pretty thing alone. Our women fetishized
Sexualized for their accents
Called romantic
Even when fighting for land back
Do we still sound sexy and sweet
When we critique
Our government's greed?
Or when we weep
For loved ones
Who left before we were ready?
Your fantasies
Of curves and submission
Starve you of real intimacy
That is given from the love of Latin women Who are taught softness and silence
Before our second birthdays
But you.
You come and plague our homeland
For unholy reasons
Yet you’ve found God in her lips
Heaven in her hips
You have become a believer
As she brings you back from the dead
A feat you never reciprocated
On her end.
May every murdered young girl
Find friendship in the wind
Shelter under trees
Cloth in leaves
May she be wiped clean
To find sanctuary in the streams
Where her heart stopped.
Do not blame our women for their survival tactics While those who speak up are murdered to martyrdom The next time you hold one in your arms
Remember those who sought out similar comforts Only to be met with bruises beaten into mindsets Blood spilled that will never be seen
And pay homage
To mis hermanas
Who’s souls make our roses smell so sweet. May they all find a kinder world in the afterlife.
Cover Photo by Lisa Fotios.