http://amaejournal.utsa.edu ISSN: 2377-9187 Volume 12 Issue 3 2018 AMAE Special Issue Latinx Education Policy and Resistance in the Trump Era Guest Editors Patricia D. López, California State University, Fresno William Pérez, Loyola Marymount University Editors Patricia Sánchez The University of Texas at San Antonio Antonio J. Camacho AMAE, Inc. Associate Editors Julie L. Figueroa Sacramento State Lucila D. Ek The University of Texas at San Antonio Association of Mexican American Educators Journal A peer-reviewed, open access journal http://amaejournal.utsa.edu/ Cedillo Association of Mexican American Educators (AMAE) Journal © 2018, Volume 12, Issue 3 195 Pilgrim By Matt Sedillo See some were born to summer homes And palatial groves Where pain was only to ever unfold From the pages of Secret Gardens Where the Red Fern Grows But not I See I come from the stock Of starry-eyed astronauts Who greet the night sky With big dreams and wide eyes Always Running Down the Devil’s Highway Through Occupied America On the way back to The House on Mango Street And all those other books You didn’t want us to read Raised on handball Off the back wall Of a panaderia Born East the river Post Mendez vs Westminster One generation removed From the redlines And diplomas that were signed That those dreams https://doi.org/10.24974/amae.12.3.413 Pilgrim Association of Mexican American Educators (AMAE) Journal © 2018, Volume 12, Issue 3 196 In that skin Need not apply See I come from struggle And if my story offends you It’s only cause you made The mistake of seeking your reflection In my self portrait See this Well this may not be about you Because while some were born To the common core Whose reflected faces 196Where old world hardships Crashed against new shores New England New Hampshire New Jersey New York For others pushed off Turtle island Aztlan Do not call this brown skin immigrant Child of the sun Son of the conquest Mexicano blood Running through the veins Of the East side of Los Angeles Do not tell him In what native tongue His song would best be sung Do not tell me Cedillo Association of Mexican American Educators (AMAE) Journal © 2018, Volume 12, Issue 3 197 Who I am Cause I was raised just like you Miseducated in some of those very same schools Off lessons and legends Of honest injuns and Christian pilgrims And a nation of immigrants All united in freedom That is until they pulled aside My white friend Pointed directly at me And said Scott I judge you by the company you keep And you spend your time with this And that’s the same old story since 1846 The adventures of Uncle Sam The stick up man Hey wetback Show me your papers Now give me your labor The Melting Pot Was never meant for the hands That clean it The American dream Has always come at the expense Of those who tucked it in And you don’t know that Cause you don’t teach it Could write you a book But you won’t read it So you know what This is about you Pilgrim Association of Mexican American Educators (AMAE) Journal © 2018, Volume 12, Issue 3 198 And 1492 And the treaty of Guadalupe California missions And Arizona schools And these racists That try to erase us As we raise their kids In cities that bare our names But you’re going to learn Something today Cause from Ferdinand To minuteman From Arpaio To Alamo From Popol Vuh To Yo Soy Joaquin To the Indian that still lives in me From Mexico 68 To the missing 43 They tried to bury us They didn’t know we were seeds From Cannanea mine To Delano strike From the Plan De Ayala Emiliano Zapata Joaquin Murrieta Las Adelitas Brown Berets Y Zapatistas From Richard Nixon To the Third Napoleon Cedillo Association of Mexican American Educators (AMAE) Journal © 2018, Volume 12, Issue 3 199 From Peckinpah To Houston From Lone Star Republic To Christopher Columbus All the way down To Donald Trump We didn’t cross the borders The borders crossed us Who you calling immigrant Pilgrim