La Llorona
While watching a crime documentary, mami says
She would rather kill herself than see sus hijas injured
And I believe her.
I think of La Llorona,
Clad in white, they called her the cursed mother,
Mexican myth wandering the waterside in search of her children--
La Malinche.
In every retelling, she murders her infants
in a fit of vengeance.
I have never met a Mexican mother appropriate for this archetype.
It never made sense
that it would be her
To lay a hand on her own children.
When the protests in Mexico City begin,
I think of another retelling.
In the original story,
El esposo is always seen as the victim.
The female murder rate en este pais would say
El esposo was not the victim.
So let me tell you another version;
The one where macho husband
Holds them down in the river.
He is the one who hurt the babies.
Water clogged lungs pay the price
For being daughters.
Las hijas asesinadas.
Now there is a story that sounds more familiar.
Look at this history and tell me what is more likely:
Enraged mother drowning her daughters
Or father raised by patriarchy killing them all in a fit of anger.
In one year, one thousand women die on account of their gender.
Every day,
More than 10 women die at the hands of a male abuser.
Mami says
She would rather kill herself than see sus hijas injured.
I think of La Llorona.
There is a reason she became legend.
There is a reason we were taught to fear a mother in mourning.
La Llorona rips her husband's eyes from their sockets.
She tears Adam's rib right out of her own chest
And slits his throat.
She washes her hands in the rose colored river,
before sweeping her daughters up from the water
And weeping.
This is the beginning of a history of haunting.
No one can even fathom the pain
Of a woman with an empty womb.
Maria Jaime Zamudio is murdered and the earth begins trembling.
Fatima Adrighett is murdered and the earth begins trembling.
Every man in Mexico City should be plagued by terror because
The wailing women are coming.
Marichuy's mother is coming.
Ingrid's mother is coming.
Las madres de Mexico
Are both the immovable object
And the unstoppable force.
The men of this city
Don’t even realize what they unleashed.
La Llorona lives in every mother whose daughter has been massacred,
And they are not waging a war where they will take
Any prisoners.
There are no more prayers
Or hymns
That could silence these spirits.
There are no more prayers
Or hymns
That could soothe this solemn grief.
El presidente de Mexico makes a call for order.
The women of this country are painting their pain
On his front gates,
And he asks for a pause to usher in peace.
I wonder what version of this myth they told him.
The one where he is safe behind the gates of his palace,
Or the one where La Llorona drags him to the water's edge,
And makes him pay
For this country's impunity too.