An Ode to La Malinche:

You saw the world open up to you

Through destructive deceiving deep eyes
Malinalli
They want to name you betrayal, call you Pain, sing you songs
Of loyalty and faith
Curse the day you were born
As they curse your name

But I adore you.

Above all you were a woman,

Using female energy to gain.
Who is to say you owe any loyalty
To a pack of predators, you, their prey.
Malinalli - I could understand -
Losing yourself while finding Cortes

Malinalli you helped conquer an Empire

Full of desire
To forget.
La Malinche, I do not curse your name.
You showed the path of letting go, of losing
Of letting life bruise.
You showed that there is no choosing
When it comes to fate.

La Malinche, I do not curse your name.

Inspiration: Lora Mathis

Reflection:
Because odes are most commonly written to honor a person, I wanted to write an ode to someone who is
usually shamed as an ironic twist. La Malinche was said to be a mistress of Hernan Cortes who helped
conquer the Aztec empire. Because she was an Aztec herself, she is labelled as a traitor and associated
with betrayal in the Mexican culture. However, I wanted to celebrate La Malinche because she was an
educated woman who was a translator and interpreter. Women are often underestimated and not allowed
to have their stories heard. Throughout the poem, I tried to incorporate rhyme yet followed no specific
pattern. I also tried to incorporate allegory, as the poem will definately be better understood when a
person knows La Malinche’s background. However, I believe the poem is still able to be open to
interpretation and relatable without background knowledge as it incorporated multiple aspects of life an
individual may experience. For example, love, betrayal, and loyalty. A specific example of allegory
would be “Who is to say you owe any loyalty To a pack of predators, you, their prey.” while a person
without background knowledge may connect this to a situation/part of their life, a person with background
knowledge may interpret this line to be about Malinche’s traumatic childhood, and being sold off into
slavery.

PSILOCYBE

I have no groove to cross my heart

Nor stick a groovy needle in my eye
So with your cosmic love I must part

Psilocybe, connecting my reality into a restart

I travelled through icy villages in mid-July
This leaving is hard, I have no groove to cross my heart

The darkened desolate dirt road splitting apart

Psilocybe is all I need to fly
So with your cosmic love I must part

This...is exactly how life imitates art

Life will not offer another try
I have no groove to cross my heart

I have found my one true counterpart

Feeding me the freedom of goodbye
Yet with this cosmic love I must part

My moody sweetheart
I will even sing you a lullaby
Do not hope that I will have groove to cross my heart
Because with this cosmic love I must part.

Reflection:
I decided to counter the idea of writing a fairly strictly structured poem like a villanelle (The structure of
rhyming pattern and repetition) with writing in a more freeing manner. I decided not to necessarily write
about a structured person, place, thing or idea and instead just let my words go. For example, I wanted to
incorporate the word “groovy” simply because I enjoy the way it sounds not necessarily worrying if it
provides literal sense. Again, I believe this poem is really left open to interpretation and I like that about
poetry. There is no right or wrong answer with this poem. The title of the poem is psilocybe which is a
chemical compound associated with producing psychedelic visions and experiences. Psychedelic
experiences have been associated with a spiritual awakening in multiple cultures. I wanted this poem to
be about how a when a person leaves a situation, especially toxic, such as a toxic relationship - there is
opportunity to grow and have an awakening. Psilocybe, going through an out of world experience which
leads to an impactful out of world realization. However,I want this poem to be interpreted in a variety of
ways and evoke emotion in the reader through a connection with a particular memory or event.

An Ode to the women fighting against abortion rights:

You scream murder!

And your neatly sharp picket signs engrave biblical verses
As if
They were facts into my mind
Verses written by John, Peter, James, and Joshua
Verses not written by hands like yours, Linda.
You scream murder, Linda. You scream sin.
And I only want to take you back to Medieval Times, when you
Were sin.
You were a woman.
God’s creation of temptation.
A symbol for Eve,
A woman who made a decision for herself, and doomed man-kind
You scream murder!
And I want to take you to the planned parenthood shooting
Where a pro-life terrorist took three lives.
Scream murder again, Linda!
Scream sin again!
Let me take you to your government Linda,
Where
John, Peter, James, and Joshua
Have meetings about your health and reproductive system
And write 694 bills to try and regulate your body, Linda.
This is a war.
You and your soldiers, with your pro-life picket signs are in battle
Willing to die for those who made this war against you.
So, why, Linda, do so many great generals fight on the wrong side??

Inspiration: Olivia Gatwood

Reflection: I decided to write another ode as I enjoy the idea of writing poems that address something,
or poems to someone. This time, I decided to make my ode heavily ironic and portray a sarcastic tone. I
am a feminist and so for multiple reasons I am extremely pro-choice and in support of planned
parenthood. Therefore, if this was a genuine ode, I would not be writing it to women fighting against
abortion rights. However, I believe this is what gives the poem a sarcastic twist. Is that the ode is not
genuine and used to call out a group of people when nodes are commonly used to honor people. The ode
is particularly addressing women to emphasize the importance that the “best generals are fighting on the
wrong side”. That women are extremely powerful, and can accomplish so much change and it is
disheartening when women give into forms of oppression. In this poem, I chose to incorporate the idea of
religion, specifically Christianity, for multiple reasons. Firstly, I wanted to name the apostles as a symbol
that religion has been most inclusive to men. That men created the social construct of religion, the same
way men have majority control over government and industries in present day. I wanted to symbolize that
it was men who perpetrated the word of jesus, and now it is men influencing women’s health choices and
reproductive rights - which is unfair considering female reproductive rights should not be influenced by
the opinion of those who are not female. Secondly, incorporating religion could symbolize how despite
the idea of separating church and state, much of pro-life arguments revolve around religious notions. I
wrote this poem as a spoken-word, because I believe if performed, this poem has the potential to be
highly emotional and encouraging - like Olivia Gatwood spoken word poems.

***EXTRAS and IDEAS***

An Ode to the Emergency Exit

Your striking rays of fire and all that is red

Did not strike me
The bleak, empty walls
Surround your presence
You have a way of being there
Dispersing entrapment
You, emergency exit, had seasons and ages of practice
Ages to practice
The chokehold on me
Flirtatious smirks
At my lost dreams
Yet you are labelled
An emergency exit
In every building, every corner
I forgot to admit to myself
Like I oftenly do
That If I walk through the door you lead me through
I will walk into the comfort of gray.
The comfort of uncertainty
Your violent rays of red
Did not strike me
Until you striked me
On the cheek.

I am covered in parts of glitter not

Gold
It is this way that seasons do change
And I can still grow.