Being Mixed
Being half-breed doesn't always have its perks.
Growing up mixed I always had a different approach towards myself and the way I allowed myself to see the world.
High school was hard and interesting, it being a majority African-American, while the Hispanic and white population hardly stood a chance.
Being in classrooms as the minority in a room of a sea of different shades of black really opened my eyes to the world of diversity.
I grew up knowing I was Mexican and white but sometimes to individuals you're either too Mexican or white and not enough for either.
For as long as I've been in this world, experiencing and seeing things, I can say that once people find out that I'm white and Mexican, they forget the whiteness I carry.
So, through my entire time of growing, I can honestly say that I've completely always tried to connect with being Hispanic, and left my heritage of being white to the curb.
It's funny because even being half white, I have never really gotten along with people who are white. Maybe that's a shame, but I have always gotten along with people who are African-American.
Sometimes in the back of my mind, I think if I was around more white and Hispanic kids then maybe I would have thought and acted differently. I'm not saying that I regret being friends with people of African descent.
What I am merely saying is that people say the races of people you are exposed to determine the way you expose yourself to the world. I'm not sure if I believe that.
But I do believe being mixed is not easy, especially when it comes to relationships.
I say this because honestly, parents do not like it when their kids date outside their race. It's unheard of.
Me personally being mixed and dating someone outside my race who is also mixed brings problems. People said to me, you'll deal with problems, stares, and rude comments but I've dealt with those things just being what I am.
My family will never understand and maybe they never will.
I finally was able to deal with myself when I wrote a poem about being mixed and writing really helped me learn to love myself. Yet, I'm still learning how to.
Yet, it would be a lie if I did not say I have not gotten stares and my family has not tried to ram the idea of my relationship with my boyfriend as a terror more than a happiness down my throat.
My boyfriend is black and Korean, while I'm white and Mexican mixed along with so much, I might as well be considered dang rainbow. It does hurt being told things that follow racism because racism is at every corner. In my poem I tired to address racism at face value.
Mango Queens
My poem based on being mixed...
Hispanic is a census term that some dildo in a government office made up to include all Spanish-speaking brown people. It is especially annoying to Chicanos because it is a catch-all term that includes the Spanish conqueror. By definition, it favors European cultural invasion, not indigenous roots.
— Cheech Marin
Find me in the cobblestones of
Basilica de nuestra señora de Guadalupe
Tell my queen of belleza and spice,
that I pray to at night;
maybe I lack self esteem but were exchanging
languges as my tongue only
knows how to stumble over hot sauce
syllables like rapid fire.
White girl,
Weda,
Wedita,
Tap on me
They sing like a song
like Pin pon es un Muneco
Carmel mixed with vanilla
skin, I am a swirl. A daughter
of a man, people think is boarder jumper.
The daughter of an owner
of a house on an American Street.
My veins are rich with native blood,
they run through the veins of leaves
and the barks of trees.
Delicate features,
yet so strong, high cheek
bones blended with hair
that caresses our faces
that pick the sweet mangos.
They ask if my tongue is split?
Lenguas colliding in the
sweetness of papayas,
too american to abide
the taste with the flavor
of betrayed heritge
sitting in the pozo
of the sour mango.
Latinas call me gringa,
White girls call me coyote,
Black girls, say I talk to ghetto,
but they still ask me to translate
spanish to english.
I have become the oppressed,
the impure grain of rice
that doesn't match my white
mother, or my light skinned father.
Too light, too dark,
to cautious to be hispanic
and to free to be milky white.
We are losing our voices,
our language as we are restricted
to hear, "We only Speak English,
In this country."
This country of free speech,
where men ask, "Hey, Shortie
do you got a green card to be
in this country?"
Or "What are you mixed with?
Your pretty to just be white? Or
"Did your cross the border?"
Or my favorite, "Go back to your country?"
Soy de un pais
Vivo en un país y nunca he estado. My skin as dark as the Spanish
ink, I have been soaked in.
Wrapped with massa,
dipped in the holy water,
I am a Rein, the fifth
goddess of Tlazolteotl.
This beauty not often seen,
so foolish men will lust
like chicauchas,
as our curves lead to our hips
adoring our movements.
We are the mango reins,
women of sugar canes that carry
babies upon their backs,
working Green fields of cane.
With hips to embrace our ninos Like munecas
These sidewalks Of so called freedom
say Aye Mami, mamacita,are you from the motherland,
Because you got some flavor Samba,Salsa, and bachata.
Mango queens have the wicked Spanish eyes,
red lips like spice
That mesmerize
las humildes palabras
de poetas
We walk these sidewalks with our
Culture in our tongues, we are
The mango queens, the maids In your
houses and the ones Who raise your children.
Hands on our cinturas With the loud sweet
laughter With winged makeup to show
We are just as bontia as the
Next race above you.
Showing the rebellious Chewing of gum,
as red Lips suck on paletas dulces With giant
dresses With imprinted quincenera Memories
left on our faces.
My hair smells of tamales,
my hands deep in to my ancestors
home, as mole covers my arms,
the grease of tacos stains
my fingertips, for the gell
that brings back my hair.
Red painted on my lips
like Selena Quintella,
I dance to Tejano,
and Reggaton.
My cousins words play
in my head like the strumming
of a spanish guitar.
As the words say your half white,
shut it down for every post,
of supporting the heritage
I choose to be seen in.
I have not accepted that I am White,
I still have not accepted that my skin color, is the inside
of the fruit Zapote Negro.
So what's so wrong with being half Hispanic,
Hiding my quiet accent, covering the milky White I own.
I am a mango queen, Mami, mamacita
a girl of brown heritage that speaks.
My lips are of my anscestors
motherland, my hips a sign
that I can embrace my ninos,
my dark hair a sign of forigen
dialet, and my eyes may be fierce
but terrifed.
I am caught in words of gringa,
swirly, mutt and coyote.
Raised with two ideas, two skin colors,
I never realized I was stuck between,
I am the blood of both races.
My spanish has become the other half,
of the photograph, that my family decides
to show me.
Just like my blood I am just as beautiful
as the land of my ancestors that was stolen
from them like my grandmothers language.
So do not define me from the darkness
of my skin, to the beauty that cannot be
defined by a double standard.
I am made from the flesh and bones
of both lands, made with European hands,
touched by the juices of mexican fruit
and planted in a white skinned belly.
Owned with hips that
are hip to the latin
culture, not all latinas
speak spanish,
so don't label me white
girl.
This poem allowed me to release myself into who I wanted to be and it helped me completely. So, my dear readers who are mixed, you can find yourself and love yourself but remember that reality is what we make it.
Being mixed is forever being told go back to your country, you're a wetback, spic, vanilla and those words will hurt.
Yet, being mixed opens your eyes to both worlds at once.
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