Habra la Puerta for Dolores Huerta

Habra la puerta para Dolores Huerta.

Tu sabes, la madre, educator, organizer,

freedom fighter coming to visit

for a brief moment,

para compartir las cuentas del campesino,

those god awful stories

of ridicule, oppression, and hate. 

Stories of caretakers of the earth,

With backs scarred

by leather whips

by patrones quienes son bien cabrones.

Habra la puerta para Dolores Huerta.

Invite her in from the picket line

stinging her burning sensation

with a

 desire

so that farmworkers might aspire.

Offer her a cup of hot coffee

from the pot of justice

overflowing every summer morning

as the sun rises, bringing heat to crops

burning backs of campesinos,

drying open wounds into cascaras

like burnt raisins in the sun.

Habra la puerta para Dolores Huerta.

Take her out of that cold jail cell

turning into a living hell

where she spent la noche

carving the word courage

on a placa for la next marcha.

Walk with Dolores Huerta para abrir la puerta

de justicia que esta atrancada

whose keys are rusty, drenched in pesticides

hanging from the baggy pants

of those who protect el mal puesto

musty from attitudes turned into strychnine.

Habra la puerta para Dolores Huerta.

Listen to her screams for equality

noise of shrill sirens

resounding in communities

calling you to boycott friendly fruits

now somehow transformed

into enemies

caught in political warfare.

Habra la puerta para Dolores Huerta.

Habra la puerta para Dolores Huerta.

Ramon del Castillo

copyright 4/2000