“…when our troops were separated by color, like when you do the laundry”

César Chavez, age 16 in U.S. Navy ca 1946

Believing in equality for all

A tribute on Memorial Day 2019

​Patriotismo – Que Es?
By San Juana Guillermo

​Do we have to go to war in an unknown land
            and fight for our country in order to prove our patriotismo?
Do we have to risk our lives against soldados we know nothing about,
            except that they, too, are fighting to defend their country?
Will this war change the world? We ask of all the wars.
Nuestros padres, nuestras parejas, los hijos, los hermanos. Tienen que
            sufrir our absence while we prove our patriotismo?
El patriotismo no nomas se demuestra en la Guerra, en una tierra extraña,
            contra soldados que no conocemos, or that we personally have
            nothing against.
Patriotismo se demuestra when we served in the military
            even in the face of discrimination.
When we are only allowed to scrub the deck or paint the ship.
O, trabajar en la cocina peeling the potatoes y lavando los trastes.
We went and defended our country, in spite of this.
            when our troops were separated by color, like when you do the laundry.

One war receiving 45 sons from Hero Street, Illinois,
            sending them to the Philippines because of their Spanish tongues
            only to be silenced when they returned to their homes.
Patriotismo is watching your child going off to war
            and your heart is heavy and your spirit cries because
            it does not know if there will be a reunion embrace.
The neighborhood of Edgewood in San Antonio losing 54 to another war,
            with 2 of them still M.I.A., 10 of them graduating in the same year from
            the same high school.
Yet, “We’re a very patriotic family,” said Gloria Carson, sister to one of the 54.
Many of our returning soldados never honored until after death
Or, the families of those we lost in the battles, esperando años para recibir
            el Honor to be bestowed on their loved ones.

Patriotismo is knowing you have to drink from a different water fountain
            and enter through the back door.
Yet, we do not hesitate to take up arms to defend la poquita libertad
            que los permiten.
“Foreigners in our land” quizas, but it is our land.
Y a pesar de todo, we are orgullosos of our Patriotismo.
Patriotismo is not just defending and sacrificing in times of war.
Patriotismo is forming The American GI Forum, to serve and assist
            the needs of our veterans and their families.
And fighting for our veterans’ rights, who are American after all.

Patriotismo is leaders like Cesar Chavez,
            who fought at home and sacrificed for the dignity deserved to all.
Patriotismo is fighting in our own land upon returning home,
            not with weapons of mass destruction
            but with weapons of words and fearless leadership.
Patriotismo is encouraging people to vote,
            organizing them as a community, empowered with the knowledge
            that they are all capable of accomplishing the impossible
            regardless of circumstances.

Patriotismo is Believing in equality for all and achieving
            civil and labor rights with nonviolence.
Marching so that men, women and children have access to decent wages,
            education, decent housing and food to eat.
Patriotism is holding the country you sacrificed for, accountable to fulfill
            its promise of equality and freedom for all people.

Patriotism is collectively believing what Cesar Chavez once said:
            Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed.
            You cannot uneducate the person who has learned to read.
            You cannot humiliate the person who feels pride.
            You cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore.”

Patriotism cannot be taken away because we ARE this Tierra and Patriotismo is US.

​San Juana Guillermo, Texas-born, but raised in Chicago Heights, Illinois, where her migrant family had settled out to raise a family, arrived in San Antonio in 2015 from Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she had moved and raised her own family. Grandmother to 14 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren, she wrote her first poem at age 60 and has been published in several San Antonio-based zines and chapbooks by Jazz Poets of San Antonio and Voces Cósmicas. San Juana is active with local writers’ groups and at public readings. She may be contacted at [email protected].