My Skin Bruises in Bluebonnets

My roots are deeper than this sandy soil

They grow past the rock

The blood

And reach to the plains and deserts to

My family were Tejanos before

Tejanos were even a thing

Before Mexico even existed

And Spain even had the idea to

Make people like me

The hundreds of years

Aged tincture of Eagle feather and snake tooth

Eater and eaten

Spit out as a bastard of a raped Aztecan woman

My skin bruises in bluebonnets

I have been nurtured through sacrifice and hardship

And it has become something beautiful

My heart lows like the longhorns

Deep, loud,

Like mariachi ballads

Una piedra en el camino

Me enseñó que mi destino

Era rodar y rodar*

My mind swells in thunderstorms

Rolls out to drench everything

Flash floods of memory

Drench the soil

Grow more roots

Spread out farther than the plains and deserts

I was here before

Spain even got the idea to

Make people like me

I will be here after

America tries to throw me out.

*From “El Rey” by Vicente Fernández