MANIFESTO

Our abuelas taught us how to keep the culture alive with no free hands,

Pine Sol hardwood, our soles cleaned to Sunday morning salsa.

Our hands built the campo and threw stones to show

homes are found on unpaved roads where the curious go.

We are the bricks the Incas laid together for worship…

the influences, the rivers Taínos surfed to reach the Caribbean.

We are diasporic rhythms, un farolito in the hips,

A candle when the atardecer comes and the electricity fails.

Hardened concón delicacy somos,

Our abuelos taught us to express placeres when meeting new stories

In the middle, where pidgin tongues become mother songs,

and marketplaces become temples of new ideas.