Milestone 2005Milestone Milestone 2005 EAST LOS ANGELES COLLEGE EAST LOS EAST LOS ANGELES COLLEGE COVER ILLUSTRATION: Lizbeth Navarro M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 5 East Los Angeles College Monterey Park, California M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 5 Editor, Advisor Carol Lem Selection Staff Creative Writing Class of Spring 2005 Book Design Trish Glover Photography Christine Moreno Student Artwork Leopoldo Alvarez, Diana Barraza, Graciela Basulto, Shin-Yi Chiu, John Draisey, Rafael Esparza, Ngoun Hean, Ricardo Ibarra, Zong Da Li, Shugo Maino, Denise Monge, Jose Monge, Denise Monge, Lizbeth Navarro, Laura Urbino, Joel Zavala East Los Angeles College 1301 Avenida Cesar Chavez Monterey Park, California 91754 Milestone is published by the East Los Angeles College English Department. Material is solicited from students of the college. A writer is not so much someone who has something to say as he is someone who has found a process that will bring about new things he would not have thought of if he had not started to say them…; he engages in an activity that brings to him a whole succession of unforeseen stories, poems, essays, plays…but wait! When I write, I like to have an interval before me when I am not likely to be interrupted. For me, this means usually the early morning, before others are awake. I get pen and paper, take a glance out of the window (often it is dark out there), and wait. — William Stafford, from “A Way of Writing” M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 4 3 Contents Editor’s Note 7 Part I: The Work Monique C. Alvarado I Am 9 Generations Lost 11 Of Rainbows and Goodyear Blimps 13 September the 21st 15 Henry Armenta Dying to Live 17 Cars 18 Pleasure Towers 20 My Two Girls 25 Russian Roulette 26 Jose Del Real You 28 Jasmine Gallegos Things I wish Weren’t Said 29 Death Came to Look for Me. 30 Or Did I Go Looking for Death? Ann Marie Gamez A Torturing Desire 34 The Search for Reason 36 Father and Daughter 39 Pick a Part 40 Tamales 41 Travis Joe Bring in the Beer 43 (After Li Po) Louise Leftoff Lessons of Your Spirit 45 A Sonnet 46 Ruben Lopez Day’s End 47 The Ride of Your Life 48 The Adventures of Bushman 49 and Johnny Arthur Marines Coma 56 Heavenly Father 57 Elmer Horrid 59 Dream 65 4 East Los Angeles College Adriana Michel Security 67 Confused Minds 68 John Monge Henry 69 Joe Morales Freddie’s Words 70 Citizenship 74 Body of Water 75 Rudi Ramos Oropeza The Baseball 76 Nancy Perez Kodachrome 80 Logs on Fire 81 (with apologies to Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “The Eolian Harp”) Louie A. Rodrigues Words of Life and Death: 84 A Creation and Death Story Penetrate 86 (“Sucking it Up”) Pat Sandoval Beans 87 The Crossing 88 My Back Yard 93 Today’s Forecast 94 Andes 95 Benito Rustic Solis Flashback to Village Green 96 Lesson Learned 99 Jasper and Me 100 Dues I Pay for Livin’ 101 Debra Urteaga The Week-End 102 Michael Venegas Fairy Tales are More Than True 103 The Riddle of St. Ives 106 Sacrifice 107 Dianna Virata A Great and Terrible Beauty 111 Christopher Breaking Tradition 119 Makoto Yee Lecture on a Lazy Day 120 At the Ready 121 Poetry 122 Assignment 124 M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 5 5 Part II: A Workshop Poem 128 Carol Lem I Hear 129 Henry Armenta It’s a Dangerous Thing to Forget… 131 Jasmine Gallegos Reflection 132 Ann Marie Gamez The Sorrow of a Man and His Wife 133 Pat Sandoval It’s a Dangerous Thing to Forget 135 Michael Venegas Daily Routine 136 Christopher Being at Home 137 Makoto Yee Part III: Writing about Literature 139 Monique C. Alvarado Sensibility in the Victorian Era 140 Jose Del Real Finding My Other Self 146 Alexander Martinez Journey into the Heart of Darkness 150 Nancy Perez Everybody Plays the Fool Sometimes 155 Part IV: Live Reading Report 158 Henry Armenta Live Reading Report 159 Arthur Marines At a Milestone Reading: 161 Chris, Claudia, Nancy, and Henry Adriana Michel In the Presence of Luis J. Rodriguez 164 Pat Sandoval Flor y Canto 165 Contributors’ Notes 167 6 East Los Angeles College M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 5 7 Editor’s Note aving just returned from a walking trip in England’s HLake District, then London, I am still hearing the voices of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Blake, Keats, Dickens, Woolf, and Eliot as I sit here reflecting on another time, country, setting, other cultural legacies handed down to a multi-ethnic generation of emerging poets and writ- ers on this campus. Students who have passed through our literature and creative writing courses especially know the enduring lessons that these authors continue to teach us when we read, study, set pen to paper and struggle to express who we are, how we feel about our deepest desires, joys and sorrows in a few articulate words. As human beings, this is a legacy we all share. I am thinking, in particular, of Wordsworth’s well-quoted passage, “poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its ori- gin from emotion recollected in tranquillity….” In another place from his “Preface to Lyrical Ballads,” Wordsworth declares that “these passions and thoughts and feelings are the general passions and thoughts of men [and women].” The contributors in this issue have gone through the writing process of recollecting those feelings and thoughts that in their best moments move beyond the individual life to the universal. Whether the writer reflects a Latino, Asian, or Anglo background, when he/she recalls those feelings about a loved one, or the time of crossing over from innocence to experience, or that enlightening moment of self-awareness; or when the writer explores a particular subject matter like identity or race, or even a literary text, his/her poem, personal narrative, short story, or essay reaches some core that we can all respond to or learn from. For example, as in other recent issues, Milestone 2005 includes a sam- pling of essays (refer to “Writing about Literature”) written in response to literary works studied in class. My hope is that they will be of some help to students who are doing a close reading of a text, keeping in mind, of course, that each instructor and assigned paper have their own requirements. Another added section is “A Workshop Poem,” a series of poems which evolved out of a class exercise in which I wanted the students to M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 4 8 focus on imagery and texture. Finally, a section on their experience of seeing, being in the presence of a live reader. For many, attending a live reading is a first-time event. Once again, I would like to thank the students in the Spring 127 Creative Writing course, who applied their workshop skills to selecting the first cut of submissions for this issue. As always, Milestone belongs to the writers, artists, and students on this campus as well as the communi- ty. Those of us who have nurtured them in our classes, counseled them through the transfer process, and represented them on the administra- tive level know the importance of having their creative and academic works represented in a college literary journal. I would also like to express my ongoing appreciation to Trish Glover, Graphic Arts Designer; members of the Art Department, in particular Chris Moreno for her gathering of student art in this issue; members of the English Department, and my colleagues on the Milestone Committee: Susan Suntree and Joan Gurfield. Congratulations for another successful publication. — Carol Lem, Sierra Madre 8/16/05 9 East Los Angeles College Monique C. Alvarado | I Am I am of languid tropical breezes, The trade winds bring word of new spices. I am of sweet mangos that drip with sweetness, A thousand tropical hurricanes that I have never seen. I am of La Isla de Encanta and Little Havana Celia Cruz and Buena Vista Social Club fill my heart with rhythm I am of King Taco and Cinco de Mayo Nourish me on my late Friday nights, drink to Victoria! I am of Guanina and her Cristobal Forgotten lovers of the tree I am of America and El Mundo Nuevo I have forgotten the mother tongue which lives in my blood I am of Pasteles, Arroz con Gandules, Enchiladas and Ropa Vieja My tools are the pilòn and caldero, Cocina Criolla I am of the Taino, the Aztec, the Spaniard and the Moors The bulerias of Granada move my feet. I am of Santeria y Los Orishas Ochùn and Yemayà The slave lives within me. I am of Platanos, Pan dulce and Horchata It reminds me of home I am of confusion and mixed heritage I am of me. “Los Hijos de La Chingada,” the sons of the fucked. Grito de la Second-Generation Latina The Spanish father which scorns my sub-humanity, The Indian surrogate that doesn’t recognize me, And the raped mother who shelters me. What of the land that holds me to its breast? It nurtures me like a fattened cow for slaughter Working as its donkey, the burro to plow the fields of capitalism The “white ceiling,” Guerita is a good place to be. Raped of my dignity, my cultural identity melted to “Non-white,” “Latina” M i l e s t o n e 2 0 0 5 10 On the flipside, my home heritage that doesn’t recognize me, Gringa, Pocha, deprived of my birthright and the native tongue The children of the conquered with no home Nothing more than a half-breed Not qualified enough for either side of the border Reduced to a “coconut,” neither Cuban, Puerto Rican, Mexican, nor American I am the child of –ism, only a number in the spectrum of humanity.