Bilingualism in Modern Day Poetry - Tortillas, Apple Pie or Both? An In-depth Look at Selected Poems by Carmen Tafolla

     Carmen Tafolla, born July 29, 1951, spent her childhood growing up in the Mexican-American barrios of West San Antonio in South Central Texas, where she inevitably developed her deep awareness of societal discrimination and a recognition and understanding of what life in the barrios really was, and to an extent still is, and disadvantages associated with it.

     Tafolla, an astounding poet and writer, is perhaps one of the foremost poets to come out of Texas. Her words blend in a rhythmic and lyrical form and when combined with imagination, produce the likes of a bright flourishing flower, the resilience of a finely crafted piece of art, or the glimmering radiance of a diamond in dazzling sunlight.

     As an avid reader and writer of poetry, I have never before come across such deep and magnificently written work by a Chicana writer. Her work is rich-not the way most think monetarily, but with a strong sense of heritage, love, tradition, loyalty, culture, and religion. Her poetic elegance comes from her life experiences, from the individuals she knew, and from the tension she experienced living within a multi-cultural society. This multi-cultural society gave her a platform for her writing.

     Tafolla learned from her father at an early age how exhilarating words could be, in both English and Spanish, and she uses both languages to write how she wants, and what she desires, notwithstanding criticism to craft in merely a solitary language. We see this in the poem "Right in One Language," which screams of her frustration with a society that is intolerant of bilingualism.

     Her sentiment is first apparent in the title and opening line where she uses a play on words (right/write)-the agent in the poem tells the author to "write" in one language yet Tafolla lets the reader know she has been discriminated against because of her bilingualism when she names the poem "Right in One Language" - English, not Spanish (Or is it French? The agent is oblivious to anything but English).

     In reading this poem we get the impression that the "agent" who criticizes the poet represents people in Tafolla's life who judged her and discriminated against her for speaking Spanish. Tafolla lets the reader know that she objects to censure and to being restrained, controlled, or limited by using only a single language when she can best express herself by using a combination of both Spanish and English. This is evident when she compares conformity with a scene from "Leave it to Beaver," and further rebels by breaking the conventions of sentence structure by lining up her words in the following restricted manner:

          […] placed
               spaced
               controlled

     Tafolla seems to further demonstrate an attitude of "anti-bilingualism" when the agent criticizes the author:

          […] "You seem to lose control of the line
          in this one," He says, "it all explodes."

     Defending her ability to use dual languages, following the agent's critique's Tafolla responds with the following retort:
          I see bilingüe-beautiful

               Explosions -
                    two worlds collide
                         two tongues dance
                              inside the cheek
                                   together

     She wants society to see that we do not have to be monolingual and that she wants to make a place for both Spanish and English in her life and feels that she is right to do so. This is evidenced in these lines:

     […] there is room
     here
     for two
     tongues
     inside this
     kiss.

     Tafolla has never relented in presenting an astonishing mingling of both languages in a great deal of her poetry. Her form and wealth of vocabulary exploits and renders dramatic imagery in distinctively balanced, multi cultural, awe-inspiring poems. Her poems are a reflection of who she is as well as her experiences, as Dorothy Schmidt notes: "They are 'confessional,' since the persona of the poem is often the poet herself" (215). Schmidt goes on to state, "More direct instruction is contained in the poem 'marked' the usual instrument given to a child is a pencil, but this mother-voice warns, 'Never to write in pencil…'" (217)

     Despite experiences where others denounce her for her bilingualism, she stands proud of both her language and her ethnicity. In the poem "marked" she instructs her daughter (m'ija) to hold firmly onto her language/heritage and not let anyone "erase" it from her. Tafolla furthermore affirms in her poem never to put one's expressions to paper by means of a pencil, for by doing so, someone may well alter or modify the words. Tafolla makes it clear that those who obliterate or advocate suppression would employ pencils by writing the following stanza:

          […] Never write
          with pencil
          m'ija.
          Write with ink
               or mud
          or berries grown in
          gardens never owned,
          or sometimes,
          if necessary,
               blood.

     By "writing" (being true to yourself) in ink, mud, berries or even in your own blood you are making it known that you are satisfied with the creation, and you are not going to allow yourself to be changed, altered, misused, or even manipulated. Tafolla also affirms that you are to be proud of who you are, and what you are, regardless of the imperfections others might find. It seems as if she has a personal bond with the reader as if it this poem was written as advice to someone she is close to-m'ija (my daughter). She further personalizes it by talking about writing in blood. Families are deeply connected by blood.

     The message Tafolla is trying to personify to m'ija becomes clearer in the previous stanza:

     […] Make your mark proud
          and open,
     Brave,
               beauty folded into
          it's imperfection,
     Like a piece of turquoise
          marked

     Here, Tafolla emphasizes that no matter what she is proud of herself. Other critics may scrutinize her poetry as wrong, but she indisputably states that that she is brave by making her mark open regardless of the imperfections other might and will find.

     In "No Tienes Límites" (You don't have limits), Tafolla further clarifies her genuine desire to write multi-cultural/lingual poems, in spite of the prejudice that it is only acceptable to write in just one language. She initiates the poem by unmistakably asserting the need to use code-switching (an act of changing from one language to another and then back again, which she does in many of her poems) to exemplify the impracticality of employing a solitary language in order to affirm sentiments, emotions, feelings or descriptions. She titles the poem in Spanish, and writes it in English.

     In this poem Tafolla writes:

     a slice of you
     does not fit on paper
                              (unless one wears
                              glasses ground with filters
                              for the sun)

     Tafolla exemplifies her desire to be a part of a society where people accept each other without bias when she describes a condition where people are receptive and tolerant of one another regardless of one's ethnicity, by offering the following example:

     a slice of you
     burst with pleasure
     in the mouth
     can only be tasted
     at midnight
     when ink cannot testify
     and time and conscious
     are turned off
     so humans can exist
     without limitations

     We can see that she also wants to express herself in written works devoid of the boundaries imposed as a result of the critics who typify that the solitary tolerable form is to write in a single language. She believes that multi-cultural poems surge with meaningful pleasure, and readers should let go of the idea that bilingual poems are considered to be wrong and to let civilization breathe with all the exquisiteness that every culture has to offer.

     There is a collective thread throughout a lot of Tafolla's writings, which reflects the sentiment that there is criticism towards Chicano Literature. Consider the short story, "Quality Literature," where a student begs his professor, Dr. Dumont, to be permitted to write a paper on a Chicano author. His request is promptly denied in a "crisp, pseudo-British accent" (the antithesis of a "Chicano" accent) by his professor asserting, "Chicano literature simply isn't quality." The professor was deeming it inappropriate no matter how many Chicano authors or Chicano works the student cited, and instead advocates authors he regards commendable of a critique. After repetitive attempts by the student to influence the professor otherwise the professor finally gets in the face of the student and states evocatively:

     […] "But it hasn't even been critiqued in the PMLA! And until it's
     critiqued in the PMLA, I can't say it is quality literature!"

     The student realizes the discrimination towards ethnic cultures and literature and is left with the realism of this in the last line of the poem:

     […] "And the professor walked off into a semi-colon…
     as the face of the student became an epic poem."

     Ernesto Padilla agrees: "Here we have irony at its best. The student's indomitable spirit, the student's persistent valuation of Chicano culture is poetic, and the student's inevitable disillusionment speaks for many. 'Quality Literature' is an epic poem worth writing, and Carmen Tafolla has written it" (184). It is apparent that Padilla concurs with Tafolla's sentiments that Chicano literature is not respected.

     Regardless of how society might view the work of Carmen Tafolla and others like her who write from a multicultural perspective with use of more than one language, Tafolla feels that her experiences have been advantageous: "I have always considered my life one of great fortune, and the barrio was one of those points of fortune. It was a place rich with in story and magic, warmth and wisdom." (164)

     We are fortunate that Carmen Tafolla never caved into literary critics for if she had, we would never have been afforded the beautiful works her technique brings to those of us who have taken the time to read her astonishing work.

WORKS CITED

Padilla, Ernesto, Santa Monica College. "With Our Very Own Names, or There Is
          Room Here For Two Tongues Inside This Kiss: The Voice of Carmen
          Tafolla," Sonnets to Human Beings and Other Selected Works. New York,
          New York McGraw-Hill 1992, pp176-88.

Schmidt, Dorothy S, The University of Texas-Pan American. "Naming the Mother
          in the Poetry of Carmen Tafolla," Sonnets to Human Beings and Other
          Selected Works. New York, New York McGraw-Hill 1992, pp 215-22.

Tafolla, Carmen. "Autobiographical Notes," Sonnets to Human Beings and Other
          Selected Works. New York, New York McGraw-Hill 1992, pp 160-74.

© 2001 Michael A. Loose