cry | COVID-19

Miguel M. Morales

Strange, 

I have not 

cried from 

the horror we 

are enduring.

Instead, 

I have cried 

because of 

the beauty 

in kindness and 

in song and 

in voices and 

in smiles and 

in laughter. 

I legit cried 

watching a 

livestream of 

ocean waves 

crashing on a 

Hawaiian beach. 

But I know that

a bitter cry is

coming ...

Unintentional Rainbows

Miguel M. Morales

Ever since I woke up / this morning, I've been seeing / unintentional rainbows.

The seats on the bus with / curving multicolored lines in the fabric/ reveal
a cascading array of rainbow figures / endlessly jumping and dancing through sunlight.

In the library / art students file past / my desk moving toward / a table in the back. They
spread out / colored pencils. Sharp tips / reproduce deconstructed rainbows on sketchpads.

A small black girl in the grocery store / her hair separated with vibrant / elastic hairbands,
pulls her mother / to the display of fruits and berries / a kaleidoscope of colors.

Sitting in the kitchen listening / to a report marking one year since / the Pulse shooting,
I finally let my tears flow / as a luminous sunset gifts me / another rainbow.

Don’t Call It an Anniversary

Miguel M. Morales

Anniversaries celebrate our best moments
like weddings and first dates.

They recall our special connections from 
a first kiss to the day we met our best friend.

There will be no anniversary toasts to the 
discriminate massacre of 49 people. 
No specially compiled playlist or 
dancing for the injuries of 53 more. 

There will be no surprise parties 
for grieving families and friends.

No dinners will celebrate the sustained 
pulsing pain of brown and black queers.

We will sign no cards with images of cakes 
on the cover and scripted writing inside

nor will we exchange wrapped gifts 
while searching for the nearest exit.

Anniversaries celebrate our best moments. 
Many followed in the aftermath. 
We will applaud and embrace them
in the days and months to come.

But for today, just for today, 
don’t call it an anniversary. 

An Old AIDS Activist Rages about Hillary Clinton

Folks, I'm having a hard time processing what Hillary Clinton said today about the Reagans and HIV/AIDS. So I just need to put some stuff down.

Today is tough. Right now is tough.

I haven't rage cried in a long-ass time. I've forgotten how rage tears give me a migraine and that my burning eyes and forehead ignite the tears on my face.

I won't be able to sleep tonight.

ICYMI:

“It may be hard for your viewers to remember how difficult it was for people to talk about HIV/AIDS back in the 1980s, Because of both president and Mrs. Reagan, in particular Mrs. Reagan, we started a national conversation when before nobody would talk about it, nobody wanted to do anything about it, and that, too, is something that I really appreciate. With her very effective, low-key advocacy … it penetrated the public conscience and people began to say: ‘Hey, we have to do something about this too.’”

Nancy Reagan's death immediately brought up memories of friends I've lost. Memories of my days as an AIDS Activist. Memories of rage, of death, of fear and ignorance. Everything was a fight.
EVERYTHING. WAS. A. FIGHT.

Me giving my mom a reason to pray the rosary.

We were in the streets, in the local government offices fighting against city ordinances.

We were in the statehouses, fighting legislation.

When businesses, both small and corporate, wanted to fire People with AIDS (PWAs), we fought back.

When the American Medical Association (AMA) wanted to institute mandatory HIV testing for anyone seeking medical treatment, we fought them and we won.

When the only form of treatment was a failed cancer drug, we fought the FDA and got new treatment options. And we fought the hardest against our president who let people die from ignorance rather than publicly say the word AIDS.

So when Hillary Clinton praised the Reagan's advocacy, I thought of my friends. I remembered how they gave their lives for this fight. When their immune systems were obliterated, they still showed up at protests. When their faces were covered with Karposi's Sarcoma, they volunteered to be our media spokespeople.

THEY were brave.

THEY deserve to be remembered for their advocacy.

THEY started the national conversation by screaming in the faces of the Reagans and the Bushes and the Clintons.

Hillary Clinton issued a tweet saying she misspoke about the subject and she apologized.

Hillary Clinton’s statement on her comments about the Reagans' record on HIV and AIDS: pic.twitter.com/RtIs0zpJfk

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) March 11, 2016

Sorry? My Bad? Oops?

An entire generation is gone. Hillary, you dishonored those fallen warriors and those of us who survived. We'll never know what we could have been had that generation lived. But we do know what we lost. We feel it everyday.

Because of you, not only did we feel the pain of loosing them all over again, we felt the rage.

Sorry didn't work then and it doesn't work now.

ACT UP teaching me how to channel my rage into action

Fat Writer at AWP

So my friend, Baruch Porras-Hernandez, posted the article below on Facebook. I adore him for many reasons but I'm inspired by how he embraces his queer brown fatness.

The article, about being fat while traveling, got me thinking of my upcoming trip to #AWP16.

In addition to all the preparations for panels, caucuses, off-site readings and other events, this traveling-while-fat stress is what's been occupying the back of my mind.

"Boarding begins. I line up first, not because I am impatient, but because I’ve selected a window seat, and I want to be settled before anyone else in my row. If I have to step past them, I will hear the familiar, belabored, disdainful sigh. The throat cleared, the muffled groan. These are the sounds of my body being seen in public." - What it’s like to be that fat person sitting next to you on the plane.

As the conference nears, this will move to the front of my thinking until the plan takes off, until it lands, until I check into my hotel room.

I've started doing things like walking stairs at work, not to get myself in shape or to be healthy, but so I won't be out of breath when I enter a conference room. I'll also carry a handkerchief to wipe my face because I don't want to be the fat sweaty guy.

Once in the conference room I'll look at the small seats and wonder if this will be the exact moment when one of those chairs, which has held bigger people than me, will break. Then everyone will look at the fat guy who broke a chair. I also try to be cognizant of my breathing because at some point, I'll get a dirty look from someone who doesn't want to hear a fat guy breathe.

I'll also have to figure out which clothes to pack -- ones that won't fight with me and that have some semblance of professionalism. I'll pack an extra belt just in case the one I'm wearing breaks. I'll shower at least twice a day because if there's a strange smell, people always look at the fat guy first.

This just part of what it's like for me to go to a conference.

There's a lot of reasons I'm fat and they are mine to examine. Yet whether it's travel or conferences or everyday life, I do my best not to let my size negatively impact or even harm on others.

Unfortunately, similar intentions are not always returned.

Me and my big fat attitude.

Lifting Sandra

I messed things up. I always thought there would be time to sit and have a chat with Sandra Moran. 

We work at the same place. We’re both writers. We know tons of the same people. I knew our lives ran on a parallel track and that sometime they’d cross long enough of us to talk about -- everything.

People who meet Sandra all say the same thing. She makes them feel as if they are the most important person in the room. I admit it always made me uncomfortable when she did that.

Every time I saw her or heard about her, she was rushing from one place to another. Sandra was always giving and teaching and supporting. 

So when she'd do that you're-the-most-important-person-in-the-room thing with me, I’d feel great but I'd also feel a little bit selfish. I knew I was keeping her from the other pressing thing that would eventually pull her away from our stolen moment.

We regularly threatened to meet up when we had time to talk. But I knew there wouldn’t be such a moment unless we were trapped in an elevator or we were in a hotel bar on the last day of a writers conference. Then we’d talk. I’d learn all the things I’ve read this last week about her on social media.

In Lak'ech Ala K'in | I am Another You. You are Another Me

I'm spending the morning in high school. Everything is much smaller than I remember ... except me.

La Clase

My friend Jackie Madrigal pioneered a US Latino Literature class at Shawnee Mission North High School in Mission, Kansas. She invited Chato Villalobos and myself to be guest speakers to help put some faces to Latino literature and to talk about the Latino Writers Collective and our writing processes. Both Chato and I are honored to be asked. Her curriculum is thoughtful and hits all the major notes in the rather large genre.

As this day grew closer, my social anxiety started to wrap itself around me. In fact, last night I spent some time thinking about how I could get out of this gig. Chato could do the presentation himself. He's a police officer and therefore automatically much more interesting, right? Besides I have to work that afternoon and there's a chance I could be late. My tummy still kinda hurts from when I was sick last week. Also my car is pretty old and I don't like to drive it more than necessary ...

What Does Your Name Mean??

For Wo Chan

it means you can't change it

just because you can't pronounce it.

it means just because you can't spell it,

that you can't throw in extra letters

or take others away.

it means you can't shorten it

because you think it's too long

or that you can "americanize" it.

it means when you accidentally
and repeatedly fuck it up,

you’re actually doing it on purpose.

it means when some people read it

or hear it’s soft vowels and rolling r’s,

that they will instantly hate me.

it means people will assume

that i speak Spanish.

it means people think they have the right

to interrogate me about

where i'm from,

where i'm REALLY from,

when my family came here.

it means people think i'm holding

or that i know where they can get some.

it means if i have the day off from work,

people think i'm unemployed.

it means when i use my credit card,

i have to show a “valid” ID.

it means when i do show my ID,

store managers look closely at it

to see if it's real.

it means when a friend says it,

tension leaves my body.

it means I am safe

and that good things

are about to happen.

when a loved one says it

it assures I’ll respond with my heart.

it means when i see it published

all the pushing back against

the bullshit that surrounded it

was worth it.

it means when people with similar names

see it in an anthology next to other

beautiful harmonious names,

that they can smile knowing,

but not fully knowing, the journey

it took to get them on the page.

it means we can love own names

and forgive ourselves

for all the times

we hated them. 

'Tending Hands' on Public Radio International

Me and my dad around 1970

Here is an expanded version of my farmworker post, 'Tender Hands' featured on my other blog, The Last Year

'When I was 10 years old, I began working regularly with my family as a migrant farmworker. I'd done it previously, but only on Saturdays, to help them catch up when tornado warnings ended work early or when the patches of weeds were particularly thick. The summer of my fourth grade year, it became my full-time job.'

Read the entire essay at Public Radio International. 

I’m thankful to PRI’s Anglilee Shah who read my original post and reached out to me to feature it on PRI.

Undocupoets: End Contest Discrimination!

Poets Launch Petition to End Citizenship & Residency Requirements in Contests

Roque Dalton García

"Too often, the submission guidelines read “Proof of US Citizenship” or “Legal Residents Only.” This small, but powerful, statement serves to exclude 11.7 million undocumented people (according to the Pew Research Center Hispanic Trends Project in 2013) from participating in a multitude of poetry opportunities—from first book contests to applying for major grants."

I work with amazing poets who happen to be migrant farmworker youth and I'm proud to have signed this petition. Chances are that some of the youth are undocumented. I don't ask. If they want me to know, they'll tell me either in person or or in their writing.

They are part of the reason I write to share our stories, our lives. My hope is that they will embrace their natural storytelling skills and become writers or at least be more confident in their ability. I know it's only a matter of time until one of them, one of them takes the brave step to submit work for publication.

That's why I signed the petition.

According to the organizers, some journals say they must support citizenship/residency requirements because they receive federal funds. Yes, that's true. However, having worked at nonprofits, I can tell you there are times when federal residency requirements are not and cannot be collected (street outreach, public lectures, workshops/panels, etc.). Even if it were possible to collect the information, nonprofits don't have the resources to investigate and confirm residency or citizenship claims.

Since it's unlikely that states and the federal government will eliminate such residency regulations in funding, there's a way around it -- DON'T USE STATE OR FEDERAL FUNDS FOR THESE CONTESTS.

I get it, offering a prize like publication of book is a really big deal and it can cost thousands of dollars. If an organization relies on one funding source for such an endeavor and that one source is the state or federal government, it's only a matter of time before said funding is restricted or eliminated. Clearly, the organization has bigger problems than keeping undocupoets from submitting work.

Aside from first book contests, some journals offer a cash prize. While some cash prizes are in the thousands, usually a contest prize is less than $500. Some offer no prize at all other than publication of the work and maybe a free copy (or discounted copy) of the journal. What's the logic in excluding undocupoets from these contests?

I know things are rough for presses and journals, but with the recent efforts of #WeNeedDiverseBooks and #DontSelfReject, excluding voices from publication based on residency is about as crazy as limiting them based on education (don't get me started on that). 

Because of these and similar efforts, presses and journals now feel the urgency for diversity in publication (whether they act on it is a different story). But maybe these publishers simply want the diversity of a community college course catalog where an older white guy sits at a table with a Black girl who has her book open while an obviously young Gay Latino on the other side of her smiles. An Asian man at the same table laughs at a joke and white girl sits in a wheelchair holding a tablet as they all study at one of the many outdoor study areas. It's fun, it's pretty, and most of all it's not complicated. 

Perhaps some publishers use this residency regulation to screen out possible "complicated" diversity that comes with undocumented writers, trans writers, disabled writers, or other writers with "intense"  or "messy" (meaning possibly offensive) issues. Avoiding complicated diversity means silencing complicated voices, negating complicated stories and histories, and ultimately shunning complicated readers. That might be alright with them but it's not alright with me.

One day soon a young farmworker from the Midwest, perhaps undocumented, who has shared her story only with a select few, will feel the support and encouragement of her mentors and friends. And with a prayer on her breath, she will be bravely submit her words to a contest for publication. 

Not only does she deserve the chance to win, she deserves an opportunity to be heard.

My Ferguson Story

I didn't want to leave the house today.

After last night's news of the failed successful non-indictment of Michael Brown's killer, I just didn't want to see people going about their lives. I didn't want to hear helpless sighs and patronizing conversations about healing or moving forward. I didnt want to hear people's mouths shooting details of the riots or debating the character of a dead boy.

But I had an engagement at the Kansas City Art Institute and I promised a friend that I'd attend. So I dragged my brown ass to downtown KCMO and roamed the campus like someone's lost father as I looked for the venue.

Inside the small auditorium students gathered displaying their work, sharing food, and ... they were living. They were laughing and having fun. It kinda bothered me. I mean, how dare they?

As I looked closer I could see the students were Latino. The art was Latino. The food was Latino. My cheeks started to burn and my chest tightened.

I realized this is where I needed to be. I needed to be around the young creative energy of my own culture, not locked away in my house Tweeting and posting my outrage.

As part if the event, the organizers asked my friend Maria and I to read a few poems. Not having brought my notebook, I briefly panicked but then I remembered I'd uploaded some poems to my Google Drive for just such an occasion.

I read one of my fat poems, I'm Big and I'm Brown All the Way Down; my poem about being the first to go to college, F1RST; and my signature poem, Madre de los Campos.

After that poem, which deals with my frustration as a young kid at being a farmworker, I wanted to talk to about Ferguson. I needed to talk about it. I was experiencing the same frustration as the boy in my poem but at the same time I felt the safety and comfort of the room.

We talked about our art. We talked about how we long to create beauty and joy through our work but that there is also beauty in pain. We have a gift and sometimes that gift requires sitting in our pain, processing it, and putting it through the artist's lens.

It means taking what's inside our hearts, inside our heads and on our tongues and putting it in words, on canvas, or in clay -- that's our ability, our gift. It's our super power. In doing so, we can help others process their feelings. We can stand as examples to young people on creative ways to deal with these difficult emotions that make so many turn to, and live in, rage or to simply shut down -- shut down like I wanted to do hours earlier.

I don't know what will come from the meeting today. Hopefully it will be the beginning of new partnerships and collaborations for area Latinos in the arts.

But for now, for this moment, it's what I needed. I needed to be among brown and black faces who connected in a safe space surrounded by and sharing our creative energy.

That's my Ferguson story.

#JCCC Alert/Suspicious weapon

Alerts issued by my college yesterday after reports of an armed assailant was spotted on campus:

My poem from those alerts:

His Mother Didn't Need a Man

You say his mother didn’t need a man

and now he doesn’t know how to be one

all because he wears skinny jeans

and arches his eyebrows.

You blame his white faggotry

on his brown mother because

a woman should only birth

boy babies -- not raise them.

Since his mother didn't need a man,

he doesn't buy into all that

masculine bullshit about

what it means to be one.

Like his mother he’s not afraid

to show his vulnerability

or to temper his rage with wisdom.

Purpose comes from seeing her work

two jobs and feeling her love twice as much.

She’s the only model he wants to emulate.

He knows her happiness doesn’t come from

needing someone to validate her life

but rather from the strength

of being herself.

No, his mother didn't need a man

and neither does he.

For Alexia on Her 27th Birthday

I’m going to tell you a secret,

my darling girl, about how

we became a family.

Even before you were born

you changed us.

Your arrival renewed

our damaged spirits.

Nurturing our new love

required selflessness.

When we stumbled,

your faith in us set our footing.

We found strength in vulnerability.

We found wealth in giving.

We found power in peace.

Soon this collection of individuals

found ourselves in a family.

So the secret, my sweet one,

of how we came to be

is one word,

you.

#TheLastYear

Today I'm 46 years old. My mom died when she was 47. This is the beginning of #TheLastYear. pic.twitter.com/F94AxEGlFY
— Miguel M. Morales (@TrustMiguel) December 28, 2013

Yesterday after a rough visit, I decided to start a new writing project called The Last Year.

#DiversityInSFF

The #DiversityInSFF hastag is a great conversation about the lack of diverse characters and authors in Science Fiction and Fantasy. This article in The Nation examines part of that conversation.

Rising Above the Failure of Imagination | The Nation:

"The conversation about diversity in SFF is also striking because it reveals how discrimination and its deeply embedded cultural effects are so pernicious that even imagination, the very thing that should transcend the world we live in, is constrained. Some writers suggest that they simply don’t know how to write diversity into their novels but have no problem creating elaborate worlds set in alternative times and realms, populated by beings human and otherwise."

Now lets watch some Latino cosplayers ...

Red Ropers aka #BootShaft

My awkward performance from the Fellows Reading

at the 2013 Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBT Voices

LLF DAY 5: Breaking Miguel

OK so I know I promised to keep everyone updated on the retreat. Unfortunately on the second day, I took a tumble down the stairs and have been needing crutches to get around. Navigating with them has been difficult since my room is on the 3rd floor and the meeting rooms are in another building in the second floor down and the cafeteria is just impossible to reach in my condition.

Anyway, it's been taking me about half an hour to 45 min to get to and from this meeting space. Because I'm so out of shape, it's been really hard to make a straight shot to my room. I have to take little breaks which add to the travel time.

So today when I got to my room, I was so frustrated at having to use these damn crutches and because I came all this way (and we paid sooo much money) and it wasn't the experience I'd planned to have. To top it all off, I haven't been able to shower since Tuesday morning. I smelled. 

Now you have to let me rant about this for a moment. Being a big fat guy, one of my big things is that I don't want to be the fat, sweaty, smelly guy. In addition, there's also that horrible thing that Mexicans smell bad. So in my real life, I try to go to great lengths not to even come close to those stereotypes.

But there I was a big fat brown boy literally crawling up the stairs to the third floor, sweaty, stinky and trying not to have a fucking lose my shit moment right there in the hallway.

I got into my room, somehow made it to my bed and ... well, I just cried. I lost my shit. I was living the thing I hate -- having to depend on others. I don't like it because people always let you down, right? They may not mean to do it but it almost always happens. I try my best not to be in a position where I have to do that. I have to be independent even it it means working three shifts in a row or crawling up the stairs.

But this isn't one of those I-don't-need-your-charity-or-your-money-because-you-just-want-to-have-power-over-me type of situations No, this is different because I have to depend on others. I need them to bring me food. I need them to help carry my bag. I need them to somehow get crutches for me so I can try to participate in this retreat.

After a nasty cry, I pulled myself together in time for one of my YA/Genre cohort members, dave ring, to bring me lunch. He wasn't the first. People have been doing that for almost every meal. The last few days made me realize I need to give people the chance to help. Ordinarily, I'd be the first one to offer because ... well, that's what you're supposed to do, right?

Don't get me wrong, I haven't been lone wolfing it all this time. I've been asking people to fill my water bottle, pull a chair out for me, hold the door and they've been happy to do it. But they don't know how freakin' difficult it's been for me to ask. I'm a stubborn old bitch.

But today, the breakdown cleansed me. And even though, I haven't been able to be the social butterfly I'd imagined myself being at this retreat, I'm thankful for the quality relationships that are developing because I've been able to lower my guard, let people see me be vulnerable, and trust that they want to help -- without wanting something in return.

Oh and I was able to do that shower in the bathroom sink thing. Your Miguel is clean -- spiritually, mentally, and physically.

LLF DAY1: Ghosts of Fellows Past

The day started at 2 AM with me loading up the car and driving to the Kansas City airport.
Economy lot.
Bus to the terminal.
Check-in.
TSA molestation.
Waiting for an hour to board.

Soccer boys on the plane.
Won the championship in KC.
One fell asleep on my shoulder.
He apologized then did it again.

Landed at LAX.
Went hunting for queer writers.
Went to the observation deck of that white thingy that looks like two McDonald's french fries crossed.

Waited for queers.

Waited for queers here.

Queers landing at American Jewish University

Gays lounging

Immediately after arriving, I felt a longing for last year's Lambda Fellows who weren't there with me. I took a moment to sort of absorb it for them and send them good energy to remind us of our time here last summer. 

I also made the decision that in order for me to get the most out of this year's workshop, I needed to be fully present. That means not longing for last year or for boring the new fellows with tales of how we did things -- unless they asked.

They're a fine group of writers and I owe it to them, and myself, not to cast a shadow on this year's experience. Though I feel the essence of last years fellows are here with me. And it feels nice.

So with that, I posted a message on Facebook to last year's fellows asking them for any advice to impart to this year's group.

2012 YA Lambda Literary Fellows

GOOOOAAAAAALLLLL!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks to everyone who donated to my Lambda Literary Foundation fund! 

I needed to collect a whopping $1,300 and you guys exceeded that goal by $170!!

The excess funds do not go to me but they will go to the Lambda Literary Foundation which does so much to support LGBT and Queer writers. Thank you for encouraging my efforts and strengthening them.

Please follow me on Facebook and Twitter to keep track of my progress at the Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBT Voices!

You can follow more of this year's LLF fellows by tracking the #LLFellows2013 hashtag