WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.260 align:middle line:84% I want to share some new work, some old work some of you 00:00:04.260 --> 00:00:06.820 align:middle line:90% have heard me read. 00:00:06.820 --> 00:00:11.290 align:middle line:84% My new work is trying to get into some new areas of my life 00:00:11.290 --> 00:00:13.000 align:middle line:90% and what I'm interested in. 00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:15.930 align:middle line:84% But a lot of it has to do with our people. 00:00:15.930 --> 00:00:18.740 align:middle line:84% Chicano people, the Mexican people. 00:00:18.740 --> 00:00:21.440 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read you three pieces that 00:00:21.440 --> 00:00:23.970 align:middle line:90% are related to this. 00:00:23.970 --> 00:00:27.920 align:middle line:84% The first one is called "Cinco de Mayo." 00:00:27.920 --> 00:00:31.560 align:middle line:84% And it's pretty self-explanatory. 00:00:31.560 --> 00:00:34.430 align:middle line:90% I'll just read it. 00:00:34.430 --> 00:00:40.430 align:middle line:84% "Cinco de Mayo celebrates a burning people, those 00:00:40.430 --> 00:00:42.530 align:middle line:90% whose land is starved of blood. 00:00:42.530 --> 00:00:47.250 align:middle line:84% Civilizations which are no longer holders of the night. 00:00:47.250 --> 00:00:49.860 align:middle line:84% We reconquer with our feet, with our tongues, 00:00:49.860 --> 00:00:53.550 align:middle line:84% that dangerous language, saying more of this world 00:00:53.550 --> 00:00:58.630 align:middle line:84% than the volumes of textured and controlled words on a page. 00:00:58.630 --> 00:01:00.960 align:middle line:90% We are the gentle rays ablaze-- 00:01:00.960 --> 00:01:03.030 align:middle line:84% our hands hold the steam of the Earth, 00:01:03.030 --> 00:01:08.220 align:middle line:84% the flowers of dead cities, the green of butterfly wings. 00:01:08.220 --> 00:01:11.730 align:middle line:84% Cinco de Mayo is about the barefoot, the untold, 00:01:11.730 --> 00:01:16.020 align:middle line:84% the warriors of want who took on the greatest army Europe ever 00:01:16.020 --> 00:01:19.130 align:middle line:90% mustered, and won. 00:01:19.130 --> 00:01:22.760 align:middle line:84% I once saw a Mexican man laying on an upturned sidewalk, 00:01:22.760 --> 00:01:26.480 align:middle line:84% leaning against a leaning pole, on 18th and Bishop, 00:01:26.480 --> 00:01:28.970 align:middle line:90% one 5th of May day. 00:01:28.970 --> 00:01:31.880 align:middle line:84% He brought up a near empty bottle to the withering sky 00:01:31.880 --> 00:01:37.500 align:middle line:84% and yelled out a grito with the words ¡qué viva Cinco de Mayo! 00:01:37.500 --> 00:01:39.700 align:middle line:90% And I knew what it meant. 00:01:39.700 --> 00:01:42.340 align:middle line:84% What it meant for barefoot Zapoteca Indios 00:01:42.340 --> 00:01:44.620 align:middle line:84% in the Battle of Puebla, and what 00:01:44.620 --> 00:01:49.390 align:middle line:84% it meant for me, there on 18th Street, among los ancianos, 00:01:49.390 --> 00:01:52.150 align:middle line:84% the moon faced children and futureless youth, 00:01:52.150 --> 00:01:55.850 align:middle line:84% dodging gunfire and careening battered cars. 00:01:55.850 --> 00:01:59.030 align:middle line:84% And it brought me to that war that never ends-- 00:01:59.030 --> 00:02:01.250 align:middle line:84% the war Cinco de Mayo was a battle 00:02:01.250 --> 00:02:04.670 align:middle line:84% of-- that I keep fighting, that we keep bleeding for. 00:02:04.670 --> 00:02:08.600 align:middle line:84% That war against our servitude that a compa on 18th Street 00:02:08.600 --> 00:02:12.320 align:middle line:84% knew all about, as he crawled inside a bottle 00:02:12.320 --> 00:02:15.490 align:middle line:90% of the meanest Mexican spirits." 00:02:15.490 --> 00:02:16.000 align:middle line:90%