Ramón Del Castillo, PhD

 

On September 11^th, Abelardo ‘Lalo’ Delgado will be inducted into the Colorado Author’s Hall of Fame for his poetic contributions to humanity. It was Lalo’s poetic renditions of the contradictory nature of human beings, his giving soul, and his quest for social justice that won him Mayor John Hickenlooper’s first Poet Laureate posthumously in Denver, Colorado. His lifetime of activism, leadership, community spirit, and poetry can be heralded in the same vein as poets from throughout Aztlán and Latin América.  Lalo was considered the Grandfather of Chicano Poetry. He was also my mentor. We shared the same stage for over 25 years as members of the Third World Poets Organization—providing poetry recitations in universities, community centers, churches, protests and other venues. This was augmented during the Passing the Baton Poetry Program wherein new and upcoming poets were invited to share their work.

 

 

Abelardo “Lalo” Delgado was a man of many cantos, rhyming incantations, metaphorical invocations, and stinging palabras that penetrated closed minds, causing trepidations amongst the intelligentsia.  Lalo never sought out permission to use his poetic voice to shout out themes of deliverance; he simply took the stage with an intention of enlightening audiences and power brokers that needed a shot of truth serum. His work, now being further digested by social critics, complimented the multi-dimensional aspects of the Chicana/o experience including social injustice, the plight of the farmworkers, la mujer oprimida, la familia, the Chicano Movement, and education.  With his pen as an instrument of freedom, he transformed words into a blazing torch, criticizing America for its class divisions in a land of plenty.

 

Lalo worked with and supported César Chávez’ and the United Farm Worker’s grape and lettuce boycotts—using the power of the written word to criticize the giants of agribusiness that exploited campesinos.  He spent part of his professional career working for the Colorado Migrant Council advocating on behalf of campesinos, fighting with Colorado legislators, asking them to be more humane as they munched on salads filled with head lettuce in fancy hotels and toasted over grape wine, while farm worker human rights were being violated as campesinos trekked from one plantation to another. His words penetrated unscrupulous lawmakers—pleading with them to provide toilets for children and families in the fields and drinking fountains for workers that often suffered from parched throats and thirst from the inhumane conditions they were exposed to.

 

He bellowed poetic metaphors during nonviolent marches and pilgrimages, aimed at closed minds and eyes blinded by the racist cataracts of the times. His booming voice like un gran oso, pero bien picoso became a dagger that would slice through the rationalizations used by plantation owners who never offered bathrooms to immigrant farmworkers, drenched in sweat, picking crops in fields filled to the brim with organophosphates. He stood on both sides of the border during huelgas (strikes) raising the consciousness of scabs transported onto American soil by ruthless coyotes—used to break the strikes. He wrote about the grotesque conditions in the fields where crops are harvested annually. In Those Temporary Labor Camp Blues, he wrote:

 

the flies are adequate

 

the non-existent toilets are adequate.

 

the lack of privacy is adequate.

 

but who defines, “adequate?”

 

where, pray tell, are the affected parties?

 

they are in the fields, working, of course.  (Jarica, 2011)

 

Lalo, was acutely aware that salvation for La Raza could never be found in the scripts of fatalism, preached in churches by conservative anachronistic priests in homilies to la gente about divine intervention and spiritual salvation as they lived hell on earth. None of America’s institutions were immune from his judicious analyses as he criticized a colonial educational system whose instruction purposely left out the Chicana/o narrative. He preached, using poetry in church podiums, to create spiritual awareness. His poetry melted down the doors of segregation. He challenged oppressive Euro-American gender traditions that reinforced patriarchal and white supremacy practices in American society. Through the use of the spoken word, he cracked open the mental prisons that the wealthy had built to protect its own interests at the expense of the wretchedness of others.

 

Lalo’s masterpiece, Stupid America awakened the oppressor— reminding them of the pathology they projected onto Chicanas/os since the inception of educational systems were concocted.

 

Stupid America

by Abelardo “Lalo” Delgado

 

stupid america, see that chicano

with a big knife

on his steady hand

he doesn’t want to knife you

he wants to sit on a bench

and carve Christ figures

but you won’t let him.

stupid america, hear that chicano

shouting curses on the street

he is a poet

without paper and pencil

and since he cannot write

he will explode.

stupid america, remember that chicanito

flunking math and english

he is a picasso

of your western states

but he will die

with one thousand masterpieces

hanging only from his mind (Jarica, 2011)

 

Lalo era el maestro de la palabra. He created linguistic images and metaphors written in three languages, Spanish, English and Spanglish, contesting the English Only curricula that catered to la lingua franca of this country.  The three languages in his poetry caught the attention of educators as he linguistically jitterbugged, moving back and forth with poetic gesticulation.  He wrote in the language of a sophisticated poet; raising the feathers of educators in universities that were teaching liberation and freedom while Raza student aspirations, dreams, and desires were on a downward spiral. His poem was a challenge for America to clean the racist cataracts off of its eyes, develop a liberatory vision, and create alternative perspectives to the Master’s Narrative.

The poet criticizes injustice in society through the use of words and creative versos meant to teach and to create critical social consciousness.  In Lalo’s signature poem, Stupid America, his contemporaneous use of the word stupid with America infuriates even the most liberal of minds as he focuses on the hypocrisy practiced in American educational institutions meant to liberate but that essentially subjugates Chicanas/os.  His metaphorical satire points a poetic finger at American society that continuously blames students for their failure in schools—without turning the telescope inward into the educational institutions to view their shortcomings that pushed Chicanas/os out of schools.

A Chicano, “with a big knife on his steady hand,” criticizes one of the stereotypes that had been created about Chicanas/os—a projective mechanism used by a society that fears “the other.”  But knives have various purposes as Lalo points out.  They are also tools used for creative purposes, one of which is to carve “Christ figures on benches;” an art practiced by the santeros in the community. Lalo’s poetic line is meant to ridicule society transforming the knife into a tool to create an object of spirituality, algo muy sagrada.  Incidentally, Chicanos have carried bayonets to fight in all of America’s wars.

The system sees Chicanas/os as stupid people; Lalo sees the system as stupid, suffering from repugnance.  The end result is that a Chicano poet will die with a thousand masterpieces hanging only from his mind.  But a spiritual awakening occurs as poets transform poetry into weapons for liberation purposes.

Lalo often read poetry at the sacred pulpit, on sacrosanct ground, where la gente prayed for a better tomorrow. During his last days with us, he reconciled the burning desire for a better world, a more just world, that he saw in his vision as he wrote:

A day is coming

in which misery will end.

A day is coming

in which poverty

will open bank accounts

in every nation

A day is coming.

I hear it coming.

A day is coming

in which the

campesino

will gather his children a green spring

and go on vacations.

I believe it.

I see it.

We honor Lalo and his wonderful contributions to humanity. ¡Que viva Lalo!

Below is a despedida that I wrote to my amigo, mentor, and poet laureate.

 

Lalo’s Velorio

Here lies Don Abelardo” Lalo” Delgado

humble poet laureate de Aztlán

a hero to those who till the soil

trabajadores whose hands

have become warped and decrypted

making masa made of tierra

for los ricos de America. Lalo

freedom fighter for los de abajo

grandfather to the generations

of Chicano poets who dared to pick up

the pen, crafting images de una vida dura

pero tambien llena de esperanza.

He read poetry at the sacred pulpit

on sacrosanct ground, where la gente

knelt and prayed for a better tomorrow

where dreams melted away

as pennies fell onto gold plates

where social justice was transformed

into the limosna of the times; he shouted

curses at bureaucrats in city council meetings;

men who had converted social justice

for big titles and bundles of cash; he walked in

barrio streets, sharing poetic versos

his voice screeched in polysyllabic rhymes

about the many times

children went without food

spirits whose presence was nullified;

he became the voice for the voiceless.

He challenged Amerika

to open its eyes

blinded by economic cataracts

coveting subliminal desires

for greed and power.

Here lies Lalo

resting in a coffin

hecho de letras

of two alphabets made of madera firma

nailed together, never to disunite

telling cuentos con compasion

about the two worlds

he loved so much; el america del sur

where he helped build a bridge, made

of Spanglish; into america del norte

where his thoughts shaped into hard brittle words

sprinkled con polvo fina,

turned into dust;

waiting for the time

to become part of the earth again,

creating images

never to be forgotten

dichos y conceptos

de una humanidad

que ha sufrido mucho

mesclada con palabras y amor. His poetry

spread onto a shroud

con la tinta de nuestra sangre

is painted on many castles

made of human flesh.  His words

have been chiseled

onto calaveras of many fragile minds

never to be forgotten.  His images

are both blessings and nightmares

about what humanity can be and what it is,

a multicultural quilt paying respect to all cultures

often times transformed into un trapo

used to clean up the hate of the times.

His spirit has left to be with his Master

to write the last verse, the last poem

the last cuento, knowing that poets

cannot write their own epitaphs

leaving that task to the tlamatinimes

of the modern day world.

 

Here lies Lalo.

knowing souls of the poets

would emerge

coming to say goodbye

in the only way they know how

through the written word.

Gracias por las palabras, the time

to fly into the night

and disappear has arrived.

Vaya con Dios.

Siempre su hermano.

 

Ramón Del Castillo is an Independent Journalist. © Ramón Del Castillo 7-23-04.