Poems

"We Would Like You To Know"
The poem "We Would Like You to Know" from Ana Castillo's book My Father Was a Toltec triumphantly dismantles stereotypes and misconceptions about Latinos living in the United States. We asked our groups to similarly attack the stereotypes surrounding their race or ethnicity, country of origin, clique, socio-economic group, age, gender or neighborhood – and to speak directly to those who might stereotype them.

We Would Like You to Know
We would like you to know,
because tears are always falling
down our faces,
that doesn't mean we will soon have
rivers in our houses.
We would like you to know,
even though our hearts are
always being broken by
the ones we love,
that doesn't mean our hearts
are going to stop beating.
We would like you to know
that every beat down we receive,
at the end our heads are high,
and our eyes are shining, with
purple all around them.
We would like you to know
that if you would stop mistreating us,
you wouldn't end up lonely somewhere,
and you would know
what pain is.

  — Susan Ramirez, Age 18

We Would Like You to Know
We would like you to know
   that we do not gangbang
     just for the heck of it.
We want you to know,
   a lot of times humans are forced
     to do things they don’t want to do.
We weren’t born with a future
   planned out, a future that said
     when we were older,
     we were going to Harvard.
We want you to know,
   we aren’t the worst people in society.
We want you to know
   we have feelings too,
     and we do get all the
     doors shut in our faces.
We do not see a way out.
We would like you to know
   we did have dreams once,
     and because we made a mistake or two,
     we didn’t get another chance.
We want you to know
   our parents died when we were small.
We want you to know
   we got raped at twelve.
We want love from someone.
We never knew what it was like,
   having someone to call mom or dad.
We want you to know
   we would have loved
     to have someone who cared
     what time we came home.
We want you to know
   our bad influences
     are our only company.

  — Monserrat Mondragón, age 18

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