In Rafael Jesús González’s Words
The Story of Calli González
In the late 60s, early 70s, my stomach would churn when tax time came knowing that my money from teaching was fueling the cruel and unjust war on Vietnam and wanted to withhold my taxes. I asked the advice of my friend and colleague Prof. Ned Pearlstein, chair of the Economics Dept. at Laney College, Oakland.
He said that I could not as my taxes were automatically deducted from my paychecks. What he recommended was that I get into debt over my head and buy a house. That way, a larger portion of my taxes would go to the state and not the war on Vietnam.
At Central Realty, Arlene Slaughter (a force in integrating housing in the San Francisco Bay Area and California where real estate red-lining was prevalent) found me the house (built by a prominent artist following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake) a scant half block from her own home. I had never been in debt, had no credit, not even a credit card. My dear friend Ned cosigned for me, my parents used their savings to lend me the down payment, and I bought my home.
I wrote:
Calli: Casa
(definición al modo Nahua)
Es de espacio labrado
se define el espacio
gruñe
canturrea
canta
calla.
Nuestros corazones
fugaces como las flores
les envidian raíces:
en una casa
pretendemos raíces.
Decimos:
en este espacio
vivimos;
aquí habita
nuestro dormir.
Teme la casa que gruña;
te devorará vivo.
Si no encuentras casa que cante,
encuentra casa que canturree.
Una casa callada
se tiene que enseñar a cantar--
es difícil labor:
Uno se tiene que ser seguro
que sea maestro del canto;
solamente con un corazón de jade
podremos enseñar
a nuestros espacios cantar.
- Rafael Jesús González
(El Hacedor de Juegos/The Maker of Games; Casa Editorial; San Francisco 1977-78, first & second editions; author’s copyrights.)
Calli: House
(definition in the Nahua mode)
It is of carved space
space is defined
it snarls
it hums
it sings
it is silent.
Our hearts
ephemeral as the flowers
envy them roots;
in a house
we pretend to roots.
We say:
in this space we live
here our sleeping is housed.
Beware the house that snarls;
it will devour you alive.
If you cannot find a house that sings,
find one that hums.
A house that is silent
must be taught song --
it is a difficult task;
one must be certain
he is a master of song;
only with a heart of jade
can we teach our spaces to sing.
- Rafael Jesús González
(Mid-American Review, vol. XII no. 1; author’s copyrights)
I moved into it in the fall of ’73 and ritually consecrated its spaces more than fifty years ago. My home was very expensive then, but Berkeley, California, the nation, the world, have changed; gentrification has made it such that I could not even afford to rent it now, much less purchase it. Since the 70s, early 80s with the election of Ronald Reagan, unbridled capitalism has prevailed concentrating wealth more and more in the hands of the few, increasing poverty, and making it less and less affordable for a great many of us to find housing. Now the nation has been overcome by fascism, toxic fruit of rampant capitalism. “The Market,” manipulated by the ultra-rich, the pluto-technocrats that rule the country is god. I refuse to let my home, my spaces consecrated by my art, my scholarship, my activism, my celebrations, my living be subject to “The Market.” I will leave my home to Artist Space Trust instead so that it may house hard-pressed artists whose art, I hope, will be engaged in art dedicated to the Earth, justice, peace — beauty and healing.
Rafael Jesús González
1st Poet Laureate Emeritus
Berkeley, California
http://rjgonzalez.blogspot.com/