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Bill Watkins, Traveling Poet

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Bill Watkins, Traveling Poet

Tag Archives: Spain

Earth for Christ?

14 Thursday Nov 2019

Posted by Bill Watkins in Catholic Church, Conquest, Imperialism, Mexico, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Spain

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Amends, British, Campesinos, Catholic Church, Conquest, Cultura, Earth, Indios, Inquisition, Joy, Land Theft, Love, Mexico, Native, Native American, Pagan, Peace, Poem, Poesia, Poetry, Polytheism, San Miguel de Allende, Spain, Theft, Tradición, Truth, Usurping Land

Guanajuato Flores

Christ in books, the gospel
doth speake, the message of
peace and love, of what
could we peasants on Earth
argue?

Must we abandon the Earth,
customs of thousands of
years, to follow Spain into
perfect quest for perfect
biblical perfection?

What sort of inquisition is
this?  Must we abandon our
gods for yours?  Couldn’t
we each of us live and let
live?

Spain came to Mexico and threw
it down, but the mix converted
some Spanish to the spirit
you see in ballet folklórico
and Mariachi music.

The hills teem with peasant life
that gives the smile of purity
to the modern Spanish streets
of San Miguel.

The mix works, and Mexico is
of such…

In the North, the English drove
a hard, secular line between
them and religion, then brought
that set of lines to Europe’s
“New World,” usurping Christ
when convenient, dividing,
removing and killing brown
people with different customs
called diabolical and heathen
to garner justification.

Sins committed four hundred
years ago are still sins, and if
un-amended it’s never too
late to apologize and restore
love and sanity, give land
back where stolen.

Piracy Under the Cross

11 Monday Nov 2019

Posted by Bill Watkins in Colonialism, Imperialism, Poem, Poems, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Racism, USA

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Britain, Catholic Church, Christianity, Colonialism, Crime, Joy, Love, Missionaries, Murder, Native, Native Americans, Peace, Pirates, Pope, Rape, Spain

Crusade1

It’s never too late to make amends.
To make a change, to recognize
the humanity of native peoples…

The British and Spanish, among others,
came to a land across the sea,
sized it up, coveted and stole.

Piracy under the Cross.

“Fine people on both sides”
tout the greatest democracy
on earth while Native Americans
remain locked up on land
we cast them to so we could
rape and reap the benefit
of their inheritance.

How many white people in
North America live on and
benefit from stolen land?
Armed theft in 1607 is an
at-large crime with victims
today.

Genocide and removal are
the ways of the “greatest
democracy in the world.”

Add to that slavery, promising
to pay the slaves after a war,
not paying the slaves after
the war as promised.

Visit Skid Row in Southern
California’s Lost Angeles,
a place I call Otsungna, the
native name… the place of
the roses until the Spanish
came with bibles and guns
to conquer, convert and kill.
There you see in black and
white, mostly black—the neglect
and invalidity of the USA,
a government founded in racism,
religionism, slavery, violence
and lies.  African Americans
brought in cages and chains,
released from bondage in 1865
without land, entitlement,
ownership, but “you are free
so enjoy your nearest slum…”

These sins and crimes still
fester; they are not less sins
and crimes because they were
long ago.

Health depends on honesty
and clean living;

For that reason, I have removed
myself from the supposed
“United States of America,”
a British experiment gone wrong.

Talgarth Graves

10 Sunday Nov 2019

Posted by Bill Watkins in Britain, Poem, Poems, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Talgarth, Wales

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Britain, Conquest, Joy, Love, Native, Native America, Native Americans, Peace, Poem, Poetry, Spain, Talgarth, Truth, Wales

Talgarth17

I went home over the Summer
to Talgarth, Wales in the mountains
of Breconshire.

There I walked land no one stole.
There I felt a connection to the land
and people, the name Watkins,
along with Davis, Thomas, Hughes
and Evans dotting graves at the
churchyard of St. Gwendoline’s…

Some graves need work, and I shall
return to work them, remember
our fathers and mothers so forgotten
when a slew of Talgarth’s sons and
daughters fled to an old world
we called new because white people
hadn’t before Columbus, Raleigh
and Smith seen it.

We vainly usurped the land before
Spain or other usurpers could,
committed armed theft over the
course of hundreds of years,

now call the British colonists’
experiment in government of
the 18th century the “greatest
democracy in the world.”

Not so for Native Americans,
or the slaves we brought to work
stolen land, promised to pay
them after the Civil War,
only to renege and continue
to preach about the Greatest
Democracy in the World.

Great on the surface for people
escaping responsibilities and
lives in Europe, such as my
ancestors, who obviously left
Dad and Grandpa’s graves to
the wind in Talgarth, Wales, so
we could go across an ocean
and steal.

The first Thanksgiving Proclamation
of 1676 was a prayer of
thanks to God for killing
off Native Americans so efficiently
with disease and in-fighting.

The natives had a message of
gratitude for the land, wisdom
and peace—

Something our bible and gun-
toting ancestors cared nothing
for, unfortunately.

Global Warming arrived in 1492,
solidified in 1607 with John
Smith and other English people
calling native Wingandacoa
Virginia, its first successful
robbery being “Jamestown”
named after a Scottish king
who unified Britain and tore
apart Native America without
a care, because those naked,
brown, content people were
not “Christian.”

Where did Jesus say it’s good
to leave your fathers’ graves,
sail across an ocean and steal
other human beings’ land?

Jesus said truth, Gospel, glory
to all that’s High for his teaching,
but his message would be
better served if we treated foreign
people with love, respect—
totally free of judgment.

The United States is a farce
built on stolen land, violence
and lies.

The land, though, thrives, and
I dream to return to it after
fixing the graves of Talgarth.

God forgive us our sins, help
us to amend mistakes and errors
to truly pave the way not
just for a biblical second coming,

but for a more full, complete
spirituality enhanced by the experience
of Native people, whose Great Spirit
is love and peace,

Glorious creation, the Waterfall
their bible,

Something they taught on deaf ears
until a day I hope soon, when
white people from Europe open
them up to hear.

The Red Rose of Celaya

09 Saturday Nov 2019

Posted by Bill Watkins in Mexico, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Romance, San Miguel de Allende, Sports, Travel

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Amor, Bilingual, Bullfight, Celaya, Cristina Sanchez, Joy, Love, Mexico, Peace, Poem, Poetry, Spain, Spanish, Story, Torera, Travel

Red Rose3

Anthony was our leader,
other friends.

We set out on foot and by
bus to Celaya from San
Miguel de Allende, the
year 1995—the quest
to watch a female bullfighter
fight.

Cristina Sánchez, torera
Española, beautiful, strong
and proud.

Graceful, too—a show-woman,
showing up the men and
bulls alike,

her signature move to tire
the bull in a dance of
deception, then go to her
knees while ripping open her
vest to show the bull world
that she was a woman.

A woman in the man’s domain,
crossing over to show it could
be done.

***

I threw three red roses into
the ring that day.

The last one, my friend Mike
helped as Sancho Panza did
assist Don Quijote so dutifully:

We placed a simple business card
of mine that had my name, phone
number and address on it…
through the bottom of the rose,
poking a hole.

We jimmied the card up the stem,
and I threw the rose into the ring.

Cristina had picked up the other
two roses… fine.

With this third and final rose, she
bent, noticed the rose and
myself, the thrower—still
standing near ring’s edge,

and she did look at me and
smell the rose.

Her eyes smiled, and we parted
ways. She never called, but the
spirit knows what happened that
day.

And Anthony, who
just watched two crazy, romantic
young men act fools for love
shook his head.

His eyes did smile, too.

And we brought love and joy to
San Miguel and to Celaya that
day.

Que viva México.  Donde vive
fuerte que sé es adentro de
mi corazón, todavía aquí
palpitando, esperando su
llamada mientras bailo en
el Jardín con Los Mariachis
de Bonito Tecalitlán.

Guardo mi 200 pesos, y preparo
mi próxima rosa.

¡“Guadalajara,” por favor, Capitán!
¡Tengo 50 pesos, vamos a tocar
para Dios si Mismo!

Pero no, necesitan dinero los músicos
para vivir, entonces, paso mi gorra
allí al publico, y voy a ganar 200.

!Si, “Guadalajara” tocamos!  !Y La Negra
ya sigue!

Que viva México hoy y pa’ siempre.
Viva en este, mi sueño, mi poema,
mi rosa de hoy…

Es lo que recuerdo cuando recuerdo
Cristina Sánchez, torera Española,
La Rosa Roja de Celaya…

Oh, boy!!!!

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