Selected by Alexis Rhone Fancher, Poetry Editor

Briana Muñoz: Three Poems

“La Basilica / Body of the Femme”

Holy is the skin of a woman’s breast.
Holy is the crease where leg meets hip.
Holy are her hands that dance as she speaks and grasp and tie and create.
Holy are her truth telling lips, (unapologetic, powerful mujer).

“La Basílica / Cuerpo de la Dama”

Bendita es la piel del seno de una mujer. Bendito el pliegue donde la pierna encuentra la cadera.
Benditas sus manos que danzan mientras habla y atrapan y amarran y crean.
Benditos sus labios que dicen la verdad, (sin disculpas, mujer poderosa).

*

This Body

This body,
my body,
that moves in routine
every day for me,
that rarely complains
how I praise you.

Heart beat
like the huēhuētl of
the Indigenous peoples,
held with one hand
banged on by the other.

Toes that feel the earth
and vibrate with her
and like an empath,
they cry, releasing her sorrow.

Skin that changes
with the seasons
and through every
orbit around the sun,
how I praise you.

This body
who acts as home
for others
and with gratitude
they tend to every inch of it.

Lips to lobe,
lips to inner thigh,
lips to the freckle
of my left breast,
how they praise you, too.

*

For my Mother, a life of the party woman

I am a wild woman,
greñuda woman,
shut your lips type of woman,
dance on table tops kind of woman.
I am made from my grandmother’s stubborn rib
and my great grandmother’s had-too-much-to-drink liver,
made from the dirt on the faces of children at play,
and from the sweat of my father
working underneath a summer sun.
I am a wild woman,
uncensored kind of woman,
a “You don’t like me? You can leave” sort of woman,
don’t need your permission kind of woman,
as a matter of fact, I make the rules type woman.
I am a warrior doll woman
but a treat others with kindness woman.
I am a “Loose Lipped” woman,
word vomit woman,
Hair flying
Wild With The Wind woman,
scares the men away woman,
made from the hands that patty-cake masa into tamales
made from hooves of horses
and my mother’s soles dancing, tap tap, for the universe.
I am
a wild woman.

***

Cover of Everything is Returning to the Soil/Todo vuelve a la tierra by Briana Muñoz

Purchase Everything is Returning to the Soil/Todo vuelve a la tierra by Briana Muñoz

 

Photo credit: Dizzy Clarke 

What are you looking for?