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PARTIAL HISTORICAL AMNESIA

I was at the point of creating a colloquy between a realist and a dreamer, debating our “practice,” as Americans -- as opposed to the high-minded principles we espouse. Then, it occurred to me: “I have already written that!” – Several years ago, in the form of a poem. See below.

Thus continues throughout our history this unbalanced dichotomy of remembering only those advantageously selected characteristics of this nation’s leaders – and our own actions.

With the current resurgence of America’s “peculiar” way of dealing with race and religion, and with regard to the also-current trend of harking back to the “glorious” age of the Founders, it is useful to remember that some of those very same hands that endorsed the founding documents also wielded the lash of oppression over people whom they themselves bought, sold, imprisoned for life, and forced to toil without compensation!

AMERICAN HERITAGE

By Curtis W. Long

The voices of doom are heard in the land.

They ask: What is it they all want now?

We share all this room, we lend them a hand;

we must have done something wrong, somehow.

They tend now to crow and hyphenate so,

A tendency quite disconcerting.

Equality's now the law, don't you know;

They’re not constitution’ly hurting.

The answer comes back, a whip's snappy crack:

Where were you when we were there suffering?

We tried to get in; you ordered us back;

A deaf ear you turned to our uttering.

You sewed up a flag and had a nice war,

Declaring this land for humanity.

We wondered what all the fighting was for,

As we saw no change in your sanity.

You first stole our land and locked us away,

And called us inhuman and savages.

Through games of chance, now, we make mis’ry pay;

You say we take unfair advantages.

We sailed from that old Dark Continent's dock,

In chains and in abject humility.

But, we arrived, not upon Plymouth Rock;

Our voyage was meant for utility.

The South rode high on our bent-bodies' sweat;

The North chafed, and sabers went a-rattling.

Abe Lincoln was forced—the challenge he met;

Reluctantly, chains fell a-clattering.

But, freedom, we found, was short-lived; what's more,

Old Jim Crow would make us rue the day.

Sans acre, sans mule, for the nouveaux poor;

The next hundred years, there'd be hell to pay.

You welcomed us in to drive spike to rail,

We united both your coasts, east to west.

You ridiculed us, you pulled our pigtails;

You drove us hard, kept your feet on our chests.

Then, when the building of rails was all done,

And we sought our rightful place among you,

We were stopped by the Exclusion Law gun;

Which meant deportation for "Fu Manchu."

You took San Juan Hill, chasing away Spain

From Cuba and the Caribbean Sea.

You used the "Big Stick" to buy sugar cane;

Puerto Rico was passed along for free.

Then, we Boricuas became instant wards,

In Uncle Sam's tender and loving care.

He gave us "free rein," but he held the cords;

Now, politics is our national fare.

Citizens of the U.S. we became,

With all of the customary trappings,

Including queries: Which race do you claim?

But, what of our ethnic overlappings?

The U.S. replaced Imperial Japan

In Subic Bay, far in the Pacific.

You invited us aboard your tin cans;

You told us the view would be terrific.

We found out the truth, when we all signed up;

You wanted us for sea-going servants.

But, on the mainland, we really wised up;

A brown skin can create a disturbance.

When Pearl Harbor broke, we muttered, 'Oh, shit;

"it will be just a matter of time, now."

But, we couldn't guess, then, the worst of it;

The midnight knock would soon cause quite a row.

Our West Coast homes we abandoned in days,

For stables, then camps of concentration—

Awaiting in vain, through our confused haze,

The German/Italian consternation.

You say we're "Wetbacks," who sleep in the sun,

But in the fields, it's our wet backs that break.

We fill your markets; we tend to your young;

It’s we who put the food upon your plate.

The Southwest was ours, at nature's behest;

We are a people, civilized and proud.

Your destiny came to be “Manifest.”

What brass for a Johnny-come-lately crowd!

So, stop your whining; the border's intact.

There are no hordes to justify your fear.

Chingada madre, pendejos!—In fact,

iNo se dan cuenta?—We're already here!

The voices of doom are heard in the land.

They ask: What is it they all want now?

We share all this room; we lend them a hand;

We must have done something wrong, somehow.

They tend now to crow and hyphenate so,

A tendency quite disconcerting.

Equality's now the law, don't you know;

They’re not constitution’ly hurting.