Ode to the Homegirlz
Bio: Sandy Vazquez is a proud Los Angeles native who enjoys dancing and writing poetry/spoken word pieces during her free time. Sandy is a 3rd year double majoring in Dance and Chicana/o Studies. She is currently the Co-Director for CAC’s The Word on Wednesday as well as the Santa Monica High School site coordinator for MEChA de UCLA’s access project, Xinachtli.
I’ll start here
At the beginning
Where the sharpness of our tongues meet and greet
Embrace the jokes and the sarcasm
With arms and hearts full fledged
Emotion
With love only the hood gyals get
I’ll start where the laugh lines around our eyes explode into the sky
Our heads tilted back
Legs crossed
Loud as fuck cause that’s just how we do
Me and my girls
My comadres
Comrades
Sister soldiers
Womb warriors
The ones that understand me to the fullest
I’ll start here
With an ode to all of y’all
The ones that have been and left
And came back and gone again
Only to return with a mouth full of
Disses and the sweetest of sisterly kisses
It’s been a long time coming
But you see it’s hard to put it all into words
Onto paper
To type out all the ways I appreciate
The way you come in uninvited
Unabashedly rambunctious
Like the cities that raised us
You are loud and subtle
Your tough skin
Chins raised
Eyes low
Fists perpetually lifted to the sky
At your side
Behind your back
Just waiting for someone to
Come at you sideways so you can sock them in the mouth with your wit and your sass
Hoop earrings and door knockers
Flannels and combat boots before they were cool
Pro clubs and bright acrylics
Y’all are my girls
My comadres
My comrades
The ones I don’t have to look for when the going gets tough
Because I can feel you right beside me
Ready to talk shit to the first one that steps out of line
I ain’t gotta do my own bidding cause I got an army of down ass ladies to do it for me
Or with me
Alongside me
Y’all remind me why it pays to be loyal
And though loyalty does not always come easy
When we’re taught to see each other as more than
Less than
Prettier than
Skinnier than
When we are conditioned to see this as competition
Disregarding our essential bond as womyn
It’s not that hard to choose to be loyal
Cause it’s simple as real recognize real
Like rocky said
I might ride for my boys but I die for my girls
Because y’all don’t shy away
Side glances don’t scare you
Y’all are brave enough to let them fuel the fire in your throat
Though silence is what we’ve always been taught
Survival has always been our autopilot because struggle is all we’ve known
So all of that is just dust off your shoulders and
“I wish someone WOULD come at me foul”
A whirlwind of spitfires
My girls they know
It’s more than just a battlefield
It is a playground
A garden
A sketchbook
A canvas
This idea of womanhood
Of sisterhood
The kind that comes as natural as hair that’s been weened off of relaxer
Laughter let loose into the night sky
The way it made sense to put rubber bands on your jeans in middle school
Stuff your chucks with socks
Gel your hair flat on your forehead and wrap it all up in a bra strap or a shoe lace for the flyest hair style on the block
It makes sense to find solace and validation
In those who come from the same nation of drive bys and late night taco truck food runs
The same drive ins and bootleg movie collections
The same accent heavy tongues and dialectic expression
Fuck your letters I don’t need none
The only letters my sisterhood carries are the handwritten kind
The ones that come on the back of a postcard from chile
Or Thailand
Or Inglewood
Or Boyle heights
Doesn’t matter where you’re from
Where you’ve been
Where you’re going
Y’all stay with me
Whether I like it or not
The love people mistake for rudeness
The sugar disguised as curse words
The underlying tenderness in your “bitch please”
I know
This is home
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