Here is a powerful voice, a fine poem. Single poems provide time for contemplation. This surely does

I Am From Poem

Dr. Betzaida Arroyo “Betz”

I am from  pots and pans

From Goya and Vicks

From the city of dreams Brooklyn and Queens

Government Housing—don’t get out of your car, elevator piss,  gunshot sounds

I am from the sun

(One of our Gods was the sun–warm, bright, and strong)

I am from music and dancing

From Fidelina and Unknown

I’m from the people who cook pasteles and lechon

From drugs and alcohol and no lullabies

I’m from no religion, all religions, imagine no religion

I’m from Boriken and from West Africa

Rice, Beans, and plantains, the Tainos gift to us

From my fourth great grand-mother Matilde…She was an African Queen

An involuntary passenger on a boat, headed to Boriken, so called Puerto Rico

Not many photos from the family tree, the lynching tree, the hanging tree, and the burning tree 

The only photo, a document from the registry of slaves 

I am from I escaped, I am free, I am brave