Our Existence Transcends Borders
by Ashley Sanchez-Garcia
my dad doesn’t like to talk about it
and so i
listen for bits of his past and i piece them together.
my mother is the same,
but i am trying to weave together the tapestry of me,
and so i
ask and i glue and stitch these word-pieces together
and this is what i know.
my father,
he is a good student,
a nicaraguan scholar,
in all his classes except one.
he hated his english class,
thought the united states was too far away, too unforgiving,
and why would he ever need to know
that ugly language,
with its hard t’s and its confusing rules,
so he skipped english class.
my mother,
she doesn’t like to talk about it.
when she wants to,
she tells me of chicken dinners on christmas,
jocotes and platanos,
how her father, her biological father,
passed away and afterwards it wasn’t the same.
my mother’s mother,
she talks about it when she feels up to it.
talks about el salvador and dia de los difuntos
and all the colors of the rainbow on her hip,
mangos and flor de izote,
warm oceans and sunday mass.
she doesn’t like to talk about what happened in 1979
and i don’t pry.
she remembers when she knew she had to leave,
she tells me about the stretches of land she walked
how the rio grande almost stole her away,
how the sun took her breath and ran with it.
her first attempt was unsuccessful,
they found my salvadoran grandmother and sent her to mexico.
my father doesn’t like to talk about what happened in 1979 either,
but he remembers when he knew he had to leave.
he tells me of running and swimming and hiding
and the whole time thinking of
his stolen childhood,
of swimming holes and arroz con frijoles
and skipping english class,
because he never wanted to come to the united states.
how his home country was falling apart and it was made worse by
ronald reagan.
reagan called nicaragua a “cancer”,
pledged to stop the communist nicaraguans and so he
funded the Contras to destabilize the government
using illegal money,
and illegal practice.
and my mother and her mother
separated from their beloved land
and that too stemmed from the united states
and its savior complex and dollar-sign eyes,
its commitment to anti-communism,
throwing money and military training at Salvadoran forces to fund a war,
resulting in 80,000 deaths of civilians.
the united states
its hands stained with blood
sleeps peacefully at night.
the united states
went into central america
unearthed the gold and honey that calls the isthmus home
and does not take responsibility for the pain it caused.
and this problem is not over.
//
on june 7, 2019 mexico struck a deal with the united states to
reduce migration and
militarized its border with guatemala.
since then
more than 670 central americans in 2019 alone
have died or gone missing,
souls claimed by the rio grande,
babies stolen from the hands of mothers and fathers.
these are a few of our children who died crossing
or died in immigration custody:
maria senaida escobar cerritos,
oscar alberto
angie valeria martinez ramirez
juan de león gutierrez
carlos gregorio hernandez vasquez
felipe gomez alonzo
wilmer josue ramirez vasquez
javelin amei rosmery caal máquin
claudia patricia gomez gonzales
and countless others,
names that rest in the soil and water,
in cells behind bars,
i will not forget where you came from.
there have been countless crimes against the central american isthmus,
against the indigenous peoples of the region,
and our history is not taught.
i think of our children who will never grow to experience their first love,
who have not lived a life long enough to make mistakes,
children who will never be able to outgrow their chanclas,
who will never grow to dance with limbs outstretched in awkward positions
feeling the sunlight waves dance across their skin,
who are missing from this earth forever.
i think of the central american community that must relive their traumas everyday,
how dead bodies are photographed and circulated in the media-
we become props used to shock the world into doing something,
how we are referred to as the collective “mexico” but we are not mexican.
centro america linda,
my inherited home.
our history is one of revolution.
to be central american is to be a revolutionary,
to be a force so great that the united states takes one look and gets scared,
to be central american is
to be so warm and loving that we can melt ice in the palms of our hands and
reclaim the gold that flows through our veins.
do not forget that when we are erased from the narrative we force spaces to open for us,
we create community and existences that transcend borders and walls and cages
because it is in our collective history,
our history is one of revolution,
our history honors the names and faces of the children lost to violence,
plants seeds of resistance and strength.
and we will be strong and unapologetic for as long as we can be.
Ashley is a Blog Contributor. You can contact her through Instagram or email.