she will have no qualms about

throwing out the man she loves,

if he comes swinging at her

with the metaphoric machete

of a hateful tongue

no man who has loved a rican woman

can forget the wicked lustfulness

and blessed grace of her sensuality,

she makes love in the living

in her sacred land of histerica

(as we are often proclaimed),

no human emotion is denied,

all are welcomed and pursued

for the sheer pleasure of their sensation

rip roaring from our toes to the

ends of our frizzified rican hair

rican woman's rage runs deep,

but her love runs deeper,

she is the sensibilities of the

moon, sky, and earth combined,

they penetrate into the very core

of all lives natural existence

transmitting and receiving

a million and one universal vibrations

coming and going all at the same time

the rican woman is a wild woman,

it is true that she has been colonized

by the rabid thieves who stole her land,

and twisted her history to unrecognizable

proportions, but still and yet,

she refuses to be colonized in the spirit

and she will surely kill to protect

the integrity of the people's song

but be not the fool and make no mistakes,

the rican woman is about life and death,

if you desire death she will surely comply

with the fury of the betrayed on a killing rampage,

if you desire life, she will clearly oblige

with her sweet and wild rican-woman-madness ways

the rican woman

does not hold her tongue,

she will not permit you to toy

with the passion of her existence,

she refuses submission,

she will speak loudly until

she is buried underground,

and then she will return

to haunt you in your dreams

the magical whiff of her presence

refuses to leave the scene once she is gone,

it will stay upon your clothes,

it will saturate your hair,

it will permeate your very being,

she will never let you forget that she exists

so don't be deceived

by the rican assimilated versions

who curtsey and roll around in the

bureaucratic red tape in disguise,

underneath the white-washed facade

hides a wild island spirit

that will not be domesticated,

weeping ceaselessly to be released

rican woman embraces her power as

the motherhood of all creations,

and she will follow the sweet sounds

of her children or her lover calling

"aye mamita" to the ends of the world

in her negrita self, she is a vessel of love

and shimmering, unadulterated truth,

her truth is of radiant ebony black,

she is not of the sterilized, sophisticated

purity of the etherealized white light,

she is about gutsy, grimy, earthy truth,

the kind that is found beneath the thickness

of old toenails, in the very pit of underarms,

within the folds of fleshy skin, and between

the musty scent of warm full thighs,

her's is a truth of no return, no compromise,

that liberates and frees enslaved black

and brown brothers and sisters who weep

and pray to yemaya and chango in the dark

rican-woman-madness is just another form of love

that is so easily misunderstood, feared, and

tyrannized by those who do not know how to

read the vital signs of a rican-woman-madness,

a love that lives in the midst of anguish and joy,

all wrapped up together in the urgency and

delight of her salsa island gyrations

rican woman is a volcano,

her anger is legitimate

for she is tired of the bullshit

cover-up reality of a so-called

culturally diverse rhetorical world,

her struggle is legitimate

she cannot live in a world of pretense

and colorized marginalization, her love is legitimate,

for she cannot live in a world of lies

rican-woman-madnessis just another word for love,

a love that needs open, flowing life in

all its shapes and far reaching dimensions,

a love that will accept nothing but today and

refuses to be appeased with translucent

promises of tomorrow,

a love that will no longer tolerate the forces

of human cruelty and injustice,

a redemptive love that is completely

stripped naked and fully present

just for the asking,

(if you dare).