Origin Stories: BraveMenRun

BraveMenRun in my family
No BraveMenRun in my family
No BraveMen in my family
Dead men run in my family

men run in my family
there r no men in my family

There was an inquisitor
Who sold his bastard moor-sun —
His chains sounded like bells in the hold—
His sole tender mercy.

There was a latifundista
Who took the hands of a Taino
An eye, his wife & child, then his head —
A dearth of gold chips under a dying sun.

BraveMenRun in my family
BraveMenRun
men run in my family
there r no men in my family

There was the merchant at Sancti Spiritus
Who pressed the souls
Of African men women & children
Into nuggets of coal.

There was the doleful great-grandfather
Who abandoned my grandmother’s
Two year old soul to Carmelite Nuns
To 16 years of indentured servitude.

BraveMenRun in my family
BraveMenRun
men run in my family
there r no men in my family

There was the grandfather apparatchik
A man of the reddest ideals
Who presided over the tribunals
And went erect at the call of: ¡FUEGO!

There was grandfather mystery
He ran the fastest —
No name for his son —
No name for me.

BraveMenRun in my family
BraveMenRun
men run in my family
there r no men in my family

There was my father bipolarity
A hole in his well worn sole — he
Dove for his soul in the cracks
Of Little Havana sidewalks.

There was a stepfather, an uncle, a stand-in
All felons three:
Bookmaker, cocaine cowboy, chauvinist
Oo baby, oo baby, oo baby, please,
What a family tree!

I run from my family.

“I end my life voluntarily because I cannot continue working… I do not want to convey to you a message of defeat but of continued struggle and of hope. Cuba will be free. I already am.”

— Reinaldo Arenas / suicide letter