Maízpoesía

Moderator's Note: As part of our efforts to close out the inaugural year of environmental and food justice blogs, we are presenting two poems about corn and tortillas by our friend and colleague, Tezozomoc. Tezo is a farmer and food justice activist involved in the creation of the South Central Farmers Feeding Families, the renowned multi-ethnic Mesoamerican diaspora agroecologists of Los Angeles and Buttonwillow, California.

These poems reflect a sensibility toward all living things that draws our primordial instincts to the forefront with the instructions to care for Creation and love one another - In lak ech. Our gratitude to Tezo for sharing his poesía del maíz with us.


When Corn Silk Withers

When corn silk withers
I will have waited 100 years
for your brown feet to cross these rows
your hands to reach
and turn the soil.

When corn silk withers
I will have waited 200 years
for manure to become phosphorous;
that we may see each other
in the dusk of day.

When corn silk withers
I will have waited 300 years
for the beekeeper to free
trichogramma wasps
to eat the earworms
embedded in the cranium.

When corn silk withers
I will have waited 400 years
for your eyes to see
the splendor of emerald green
for the rustle of corn wings
to pass in your dreams
and deliver the sweet milk
of tender corn nubs.

When corn silk withers
and ears hang full
it will have been 500 years
and if we wake up
the food of our souls
will be the spread of rainbow Inca,
Black Aztec,
True Gold,
Apache Red,
Hopi pink,
Hopi turquoise,
Hopi White,
Taos Blue,
Oaxaca Green
Teosinte.

But if we miss the shelling,
Corn silk will wither,
full ears will hang low,
skin will turn yellow-tan to white
and corn billbugs will
eat our poriferous brain.
When corn silk withers
and ears are full.

9-12-94


Corn

I.
Sown under a Jaguar sky,
lit by phosphorous fire flies,
I am the corn my grandfather planted
between the cracks of chiseled granite.

II.
The feel of yellow corn
slipping through the fingers into
the smell of boiling corn and limestone.

The smell of boiling corn and limestone,
The same limestone used to make homes,
The one mixed with cement to build and adorn.
The one used by my grandmother to cook the corn.

My grandmother mills the yellow drained
corn
fallen into her limed onion-flaked hands.

Her body arched
over the mortar, clapping tortillas
clapping to a silent audience.

Tortillas are passed around the table
like Quetzal feathers in a harvest festival.

III.
I am the corn
the precious corn
the one harvested to feed our home.

Milled to grease my grandfather's bones.
Milled to become the fat
caught between my grandmother's clapping.

I am the sacrifice to living
the one lining the granary.
The human blood over the chacmool
guarding the soul.

I, before being milled
will under a Jaguar sky
lit by phosphorous fire flies,
peeling back the husk
and will plant a kernel between the cracks.


Maíz

I.
Sembrado debajo de un cielo jaguar
alumbrado por el fuego fósforoso de luciérnagas,
soy el maíz que mi abuelo plantó
entre las rajas cinceladas en el granito.

II.
La sensación del maíz amarillo
que se escapa por los dedos hacia adentro
el olor de maíz y cal hirviendo.

El olor de maíz y cal hirviendo,
La cal, la misma cal que usan para hacer hogares.
La que mezclan con cemento para edificar y adornar.
La que usó mi abuela para concinar el maíz.

Mi abuela muele el maíz amarillo que escurrió
entre sus manos encaladas y descascaradas.

Su cuerpo arqueado sobre el metate, palmando tortillas
dando palmadas a una audiencia silenciosa.

Las tortillas son pasadas alrededor de la mesa
como plumas de Quetzal en fiesta de cosecha.

III.
Soy el grano de maíz precioso
el cosechado para alimentar nuestro hogar.

Molido para engrasar los huesos de mi abuelo.
Molido para ser la gordura entre las palmadas de mi abuela.

Soy el sacrificio a existir,
el que forrea el granero.
La sangre humana sobre el chacmool,
y que proteje el alma.

Yo, antes de ser molido
debajo de un cielo jaguar
que es alumbrado por luciérnagas,
pelare la cáscara,
y plantare un grano entre las rajas.


3-17-92