latino

There just aren't enough positive portrayals of Latino life in film.

My African roots made me what I am today. They__e the reason I__ from the Dominican Republic. They__e the reason I exist at all. To these roots I owe everything.

Even the most political poem is an act of faith.

This is definitely / for the brothers / who ain't here.

Your friends, and your associates, and the people around you, and the environment that you live in, and the speakers around you - the speakers around you - and the communicators around you, are the poetry makers.If your mother tells you stories, she is a poetry maker.If your father says stories, he is a poetry maker.If your grandma tells you stories, she is a poetry maker.And that__ who forms our poetics.

The fact that Iam writing to youin Englishalready falsifies what Iwanted to tell you.My subject:how to explain to youthat I don't belong to Englishthough I belong nowhere else,if not herein English.

A good writer should be able to communicate to the reader, 'I know your life. I know what you have truly experienced. It__ not right or wrong. It__ survival. It__ making mistakes, and trying to redeem yourself. It__ imperfections, and trying to make yourself better. It__ outrages, and crimes, and insults, which often are not righted, which you have to fix yourself, in your own mind, in your own heart, so that you are not poisoned'.

The Latino community anchored me, but I didn't want it to isolate me from the full extent of what Princeton had to offer, including engagement with the larger community. Page 148

But Anja. I hear Anja's voice. Maybe I am insane. I hear her crying. I see her alone in the trees. I remember being alone and humiliated. I remember, too, the fat little boy hiding in the bathroom. And I see this man, Ariane. I see this evil man, Ariane. He laughs everyday still. He has had years of laughter. He has triumphed over the screams of others, he has triumphed with blood on his hands. And he laughs still. God has cursed us! He has either cursed us or He was never here to begin with. We've pretended God was here for our own sanity! That's the truth! We've pretended evil is punished and good is rewarded. A perfect scheme!

Tell her that you love her hair, that you love her skin, her lips, because, in truth, you love them more than you love your own.

Do you know how many men are incarcerated in solitary confinement? About 100,000 on any given day, if my numbers are correct. Do you know how many men commit suicide in The Hole? Very high. Twenty-four hours in a box with no windows can break a man. Some more quickly than others.

Look at you. Riding the gravy train with biscuit wheels.

I feel sorry for you, Detective Esteban. Because I'm all out of patience, and you're all out of time. I'm sure we'll see each other again someday. In Hell. Save a seat for me.

Not Even The Greatest Sculptor Can Mold A Masterpiece Out Of Shit!

I hated seeing these spasmodic upside-down chicken heads stretching to puncture my flesh. I imagined once that they reached my groin and pecked out my penis and my huevos and kept pecking until they got to my gut and my eyes and my brain, until I was just a pecked-out piece of human meat surrounded by thousands of nervous, dirty white chickens. I think that was about the time I fucked up a pair of chicken heads against a warehouse wall when no one was looking. Well, almost no one. Rueben was right behind me, and that's when he grinned his stupid grin. Maybe he hated the chickens as much as I did. Maybe he just knew que ya me iba también a la chingada. Maybe I was going on my first joy ride to hell and back, and it was fun to watch.

The scent of him was subtle, beautifully fresh, and she couldn__ think clearly. No man had ever brought out these intense feelings in her. Chris Augustine was dangerous and she could get lost in his arms.

A Memory Is Better Than A Phony!

The tension between people is palpable, and the ideal of what it means to be and look American becomes a preoccupation to folks around the country, including me.