The poetic dialectics of taco-nometry from the San Antonio Current

The poetic dialectics of taco-nometry
By Rafael Castillo
San Antonio Current, Dec. 16-22, 1999

At the end of the 20th century, we live in a post-modern, post-religious, post-genital, post-posty kind of world. Post-taco? Try saying that we're beyond good and taco when the midnight-snack craving strikes!

Or better yet, try to pronounce taco-apocalypse to all the taqueria denizens enjoying one of life's simple pleasures wrapped in the enigma of a tortilla enveloping mysteries of tongue-tenderized beef. What better place to raise consciousness than the taco shop, that proletariat power-to-the-people eating establishment competing for space with Taco Bell and yet untainted by cross-marketing gizmos?

Poets gotta eat too, even if their artistic pursuit usually means starvation. San Diego's Taco Shop Poets have created buzz in the literary class struggle to free poetry from the shackles of stuffy bookstores and elitist universities; they would like to see poetry in the marketplace of the people. And yet poetry for poetry's sake is not their cappuccino, because the Taco Shop Poets are fiery chile-hot -- "chorizo tonguefire"-hot, as their spoken-word CD suggests.

"We are a brand of cultural guerrillas that have taken over taco shops, cultural centers, trolleys, and busy street corners since l974," blares their printed poetry anthology, released with the CD. "We are coming to a taco shop near you!" Bringing together a blend of high-and-low hodgepodge cadences of staccato poetry beats with flute and snare drum background -- as with their live performances -- Chorizo Tonguefire is a linguistic confluence of English and Spanish.

Two years ago, the Taco Shop Poets and their musicians (Adrián Arancibia, poet; Michael Figgins, bass; Kevin Green, drums; Adolfo Guzmán-López, poet; Tomás Riley, poet; Miguel-Angel Soria, poet; and special guest, Lennon Honor, flute) proved taco supremacy by performing in front of the Alamo, prompting some onlookers to ask if Victory Outreach had resorted to verse. Disguised as tourists, they recited their activist poetry in fiery caló (Chicano parlance) with rambunctious rhythms: "We live in a world of rock en Español / and los / bukis / both making people twirl / like the twilight staccato / hunger that makes us / want to prove / we live in a world where the topless sex bar / and taco bell make some people feel / they have a shell from hell." Not far behind, two menacing Alamo Rangers approached with their two-way radios, miffed that poets would challenge the warning: "No person shall conduct an assembly or demonstration within or upon the Alamo complex ... "

Speaking with a reporter from the San Diego Reader on October 30, l997, Tomás Riley explained: "Our thing is about taking over spaces. The Alamo is an iconic space. I was raised with a romanticized Alamo story. I remember Davy Crockett on TV. I remember the Davy Crockett song. When I got older, I realized that the West he was taming was the West I came from." Besides tearing down borders and exposing the mythologies of dominance and hegemony, the Taco Shop Poets also bear witness to a changing society and demographics, as their Manifesto professes: " ... we are voiceless / we are witness to the violent end / of the twentieth century / we are witness to a blinding light / we are the canon the kabal / the win the loss the draw / the compatriot and outlaw / we are revolutionary street vendors / lost in the closet silence of printed work / we are all that is / that is all we are / we are taqueros."

These bards are emblematic of the growing influence of young voices moving away from Internet-crazed venues into truly public spaces where linguistic borders are blurred, where the bourgeoisie and proletariat fuse into a hybrid synergy of performance poetry.

Perhaps poetry has come full circle, from the oral tradition to the page and back, as the voice of the masses of people who mark events in the cosmos through flower and song. We've only begun to fathom the taco as the bread and butter of 2000. The Taco Shop Poets want audiences to bite the tongue that feeds them. As they say: "Read tacos. Eat poems."

The Taco Shop Poets Anthology (Chorizo Tonguefire Press, 1999, $12.50) and Chorizo Tonguefire CD (Calaca Press, 1999, $10), by the Taco Shop Poets; info at calacapress@home.com.