Alabanza—
Blessed be the forgotten women, the cursed women, the women who are feared
The ones who know they were born from stolen flesh and blood
(God, did You ever ask Adam for permission to take the bone underneath his
skin?
What did You, Almighty, teach man at the moment You reached down
and took something that You felt always belonged to You,
That You had claimed dominion over but rested inside the body of another?
Mujer, you were forged in fire and dreams
and maybe that is why there is anarchy.)
Praise the women who reach from deep within the abyss of anguish and out of
despair
Spin gold and survival, who have joy from breath and memory
Praise the women with the too red-lipstick
The wild hair, the wild eyes, she belongs to no one but herself
Serpents dangle across her naked shoulders and slither up the nape of her neck
Her paradise isn’t in the bitten apple, the Garden her lover so carefully tends
But in the meeting between her thighs, that dark place your father feared and your
mother stood sentry over
Alabanza—
The moment I walked through the pews
You expected me to burn, scream, the smell of scorched flesh hanging in the air
(Being honest here, I thought I would burn too.)
Imagine my surprise when it was you with the singed skin
The burning screams
You— the Man created in God’s image—
And I, mujer who comes from Alagranputa and Aleluya,
Walked with chin held high to meet God
Alabanza—
This body has men and women carved in the hollow of it’s bones,
Names etched on the soft of my throat,
My thighs have memorized the print of every palm
My tongue remembers the outline of every mouth
Alabanza
This body dances without fear
Tough knuckles, dry skin, narrow eyes
Fingers stretched outwards
Palms turned upwards
Alabanza
My entire body is a prayer that is fulfilled through touch
I am a fallen type of woman
Puta extraordinaire
Loose morals, tight pussy
Can’t catch me
Want you to catch me
Curls, Curves, and Revolutions
There is nothing stronger than my laughter
There is nothing stronger than my will
I walk with generations only my shoulders
The echoes of past are in my face
The child who crossed oceans unwillingly on a slave ship from Africa
The raped indigenous woman who later drowned herself in the river
The Spanish conquistador who died from the very diseases he carried over from his world
They are all alive and living together on my face
How could the Divine not choose me?
You, the type of man to raise his arms during every worship song.
Cries at every alter call
Has private meetings with the Pastors
I can smell the fear that stops your heart when you seek Him in the dark
And can only come face to face with your own disappointment
You absolutely reek of despair
Whisper in my ear about how it feels to be so close to God,
So far away from God
(Do you still pray at midnight?)
Aren’t you the perfect vessel?
(Am I thinking that you are sugar, when you are a pillar of salt?
Either way, you’ll dissolve in the middle of my tongue.)
Why does divinity drip from my lips?
Honey trickle from between my legs?
(Is this the closest that you will get to tasting holiness?
Do you want a taste?
Let me slither up your body
And feed you something Godly)
You should know why your Mother fears me
I was the woman she wanted to be
Could never be, because your father would have smashed her face in
Her father would have disowned her, her mother would have never had the opportunity to
speak to her again
Her eyesight would have never been the same, from the damning blow your father would
have given her
(Do you hit your wife, behind closed doors, and read Leviticus to make you feel better?)
Mujer, this is your homecoming
Mujer, this is your chance
Mujer, you have feet to carry you far away
You are already scattered across the universe
Pieces of you belonging to different people
Who have always been unworthy
This is the time to call all those pieces back
Reclaim them inch by inch
Love your slowly
You are tender too
Beautiful things, dangerous things
Always have the softest
Underbelly
Alabanza, Lazarus has nothing on the type of rising you're about to do
And on your head, the crown you always deserved
This is only going to end in one way, with one word that slips through my teeth--
Gloria.
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