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America the Beautiful

in a beautiful country the day

dreams of nobodies come to life,

one inhales the fragrant breath

of justice the petulant will never

understand, the peace of heaven

rains blessings on those who hear

the loud cries of the despised and

publics love their new country more

than anyone yet alive in memories

or family stories veiled inside home

walls. in a beautiful country with

many languages explaining ecstasy

and tears, names are not forgotten,

the poor owe the world nothing and

freedom is...

Lament

in the face of state sponsored

violence with agents nearing

with bloodstained uniforms,

in a country younger than the

swirl of stars holding dreams

bubbling in us, what can I say

for certain about equality and

freedom? fear like children’s

weeping behind shrubs grips

us, nothing about the vision

for the country paraded by

the men cosplaying gestapo

bootlickers is welcomed. I

have never had more time to

cry for my country moving on

all fours to delight the barbed

wired mouth of the man who

gives...

The Pear

he was eating a pear

on the village street

the day the Bishop

of the poor came to

visit. the fruit tasted

delicious to him and

though he had taken

a bite of it the loving

campesino handed

what was left to the

Bishop imagining it

would invite the priest

to surrender to the same

sweetness that made its

way into his soul.

h. j. Recinos

The Miracle

the catechism class on

Hoe Avenue led by the

Irish priest was a place

the kids heard stories of

the wondrous ways of

God, tales of miracles

that opened the eyes

of beautiful faces and

left the Puerto Rican

kids desiring to hear

more of better days to

come with hope and

light for them. we left

public school in the

middle of the week for

religious instruction but

sometimes it was too easy

to take a pizza shop detour

on the way to the priest’s

office. the pizza man who

tossed pies for a living said

on...

Poetry looked for me in the barrio, on the subway, city parks, streets, stoops, corners, churches, and overlooked public spaces. I have always thought of this craft as graffiti on public culture, lines about the mixed feelings of learned truth that originate from the permanent Spanglish knot in my throat. The blank page received me without question, always open to barrio reveries and ready to heal wounds inflicted by those who cannot speak the mother tongue of marginal Latinx human beings. I...

Vision

heaven came around here

last week when happiness

was on the faces of the old

women who walked to the

block years ago across the

Sonoran Desert. they have

been peeling away darkness

on the block ever since and

telling all the little kids to see

in them hope, freedom, stones

that speak and the wholeness

of undocumented worlds that

dream.

h. j. Recinos

Homeless

I walked down many streets

searching for the company of

other homeless kids threatened

like me with shorter lives. often,

I waved to the winos sitting at

the recessed entrances to aging

tenements that had forgotten how

to be themselves. I observed craggy

coffee cups showing in pockets

used no doubt for hustling change

at the subway station from kind

souls. the sidewalks cried out to

me, the clocks displayed in the

store windows did not tick and

the bruising night reminded me

home was no more...

Harvest

the day of labor was heavy

on the backs of migrants in

the field who looked up at

the sky and across the land

from where worry comes.

for several years, single

young mothers on the run

have engaged in the same

old dance in harvest fields

reminding them the wider

world of things will be kept

from reach. at night, a few

mothers would silently walk

to the cathedral entrance and

sitting beneath its arches they

would scream without making

a sound. the world goes on

reciting lines and raising its

hand...

Theology

there is enough theology just

walking down Saint Mark’s

Place with the winos on the

corner just feet from where

Auden once lived and near

to the Pizza shop on First

Avenue where Nuyorican

poets on the way to lyrical

café would grab a slice. By

the time you reach the park

across the street from the old

Ukrainian restaurant the idea

of God, creation, the soul and

the meaning of things starts

to pull you into the foggiest

mystery traveled the streets

on the lower east side. you

wonder about the...

The Midwest

I went to college in

the Midwest that had

never seen a Latinx

face, classmates laughed

whenever I let Spanish

fly like pigeons from my

mouth and starched shirt

pastors sighed when I

kneeled at the altar rail

to pray in my first and

mother tongue. the cops

threw me in jail simply

for looking too Puerto

Rican in their bigoted

little town and making

me out to be everything

they decided I had to be

save a student at a Lilly

white school. they did

not know I came from

a place where even the

little...

Playing

the sound of playful kids

attaches itself to the night

on the block. the gaiety in

the air is like the restless

hope of walks begun months

ago in places far away. they

deliciously touch our hearts

lifting hours of misfortune

and shield everyone awake

waiting for peace doves to

fly overhead.

h. j. Recinos

https://www.htiopenplaza.org/contributors/harold-recinos

Waiting

a girl alone sits on the

stoop caressed by the

gentle morning breeze.

the sun leaning over the

edge of the rooftop comes

to reunite the barrio with an

exquisite light. little by little

life happens on the sidewalks,

the shadows begin to breathe,

and hope arises from weeping

that has been with us since the

day the world went dark.

h. j. Recinos

For me life began unfolding on Home Street—the South Bronx. A tough place. My Puerto Rican mother and Guatemalan father came to the United States motivated by their desperate flight from a life of poverty and despair. Their story like that of so many Latinx families new to the United States was one of social exclusion and marginality. They remained strangers in America. Although welcomed as a source of cheap and exploitable labor, cultural acceptance and the so-called good life eluded them....