La Raza Cosmica Rap

for Tio Americo

we said we're a new race
because we looked
in the mirror and
saw a new face
not the small round
brown one
but the mestizo
who took the ancestors place

we ask
what's in a glass
that we can't identify with
instead of looking aghast
we're aglow
because we know
we survived

in our newly found home
we're back in Aztlan
the place of the North
where we originally came from
Indios brown and proud
we come in all shapes and sizes
for years now we've been rising

though we know all
our names
from los chingados
used to keep us down and
everything in between to
Chicano the name
we claimed as our own

cafe con leche
y leche con cafe
cinnamon
copper
sienna
y bronze

we're still here
fulfilling our destiny
proud of our roots
a complex identity
we claim 100 percent and
represent La Raza Cosmica
a cosmic race 
proud people 
in your face


© Odilia Galván Rodríguez, 2002


image from Salvador R. Torres' painting "Viva La Raza"