With Love, From Home / Mexico Si Me Perdonas
By Meztli Hipolito
Mile 1
When people ask me where I'm from, I say Mexico. I have only been there four times since I've been alive, but it seems simpler than to force someone into the hopscotch game that is attempting to reconcile the word “American” to how I look. I believe I am noble by taking them out of this contorted misery. I never liked Denver; I don't mean it rudely, I don't. I am sure that to some, the beauty of the Rocky Mountains or the snow down by Union Station warms into their heart with a familiar glow that speaks, “You’re home.” But it never happened to me. No. I grew resentful like the willow tree at Cheeseman Park’s veins grow to twist further into the ground every time I visit it. Immovable. Unimpressed. I wish I loved Denver; I feel as though life may be easier that way. That I spend my summers deeply rooted in baseball fields across Brighton. That the mountains heal me from some impenetrable emotional wounds like every hippie in Boulder proclaims happens when they go rock climbing. But I must admit to you now, without a doubt, that I don't like skiing, or hiking, or the Broncos, or the freezing cold, or the great plains or even the buffalo. Forgive me, for I am not a good Coloradoan. I never have been. I love my parents dearly, but when my mom asks me to stay for college, I feel stuck up admitting that I dream of more.
I dream of far more.
Mile 1,017
I tell people my hometown is L.A. Despite that being a lie. I wasn't born in Los Angeles, yet I know those highways, those tall Art Deco buildings, and rose gardens like they were my own. I tell them I grew up there, even though that's a lie too. I spent four years of my childhood in L.A., years I am too old to remember now, but every time I have a holiday from school I end up back there. Back on my Abuela’s front lawn, in a booth in a Little Tokyo restaurant, in the three-story bookstore at the Grove. I love L.A. because it holds the dream I haven't fulfilled yet. A life I could have lived, a life I still believe I can achieve. L.A. greets me with its bright pink-orange sunsets and plumeria trees. Manhattan Beach watches me run to its waves at least four times a year, never submerging myself fully, still tethered to the surface, but every time traversing further and further into the vast sea. I am sorry Denver, but I miss the beach.
Mile 1,703
When I visit Mexico City, people ask me where I am from, and it fills me with shame to say Denver. I feel my shame grow when they call me American, when they tell me my Spanish is quite good despite being from the U.S., and I bite my tongue from admitting that I was not able to control where I was born. I never used to like Mexico. I feared being kidnapped by the cartel, despite my father's reassurance that I was not the target demographic they were looking for; “Meztli, you look poor,” he would say, which offended me at eight years old. When I first visited at fifteen, I felt a weight lift off my chest as I spoke in my native language for weeks on end, greeting strangers at restaurants, hugging family I had never met before. Porque en México se saluda con un beso y abrazo. I used to cry every time I left Los Angeles. Sobbing as the plane lifted off the airport ground. I cry on the taxi ride to the airport of Ciudad de México because I realize that this too could be home. I try to explain the ache in my heart during the weeks following my trip, but I realize others may never understand. No one might ever get the sheer amount of joy I collect when I watch TV shows in Spanish rather than English, when instead of asking me why my skin looks a certain way, people pass by me diciendo “buenas tarde.” I realize only then that I have never written fully in Spanish, at least nothing good enough to brag to my extended family about. That they may never come to understand my art or what I say in my writing. I realize I had grown to hate Mexico as others had made me grow to hate myself. And perhaps that had been the problem all along. México, si me perdonas, por mis pecados y errores, no estaba correcta pero te extraño mas que nada. México te pregunto si me aceptas si regreso algún día.
Mile 1
People ask where I am from, and I am not sure what to reply sometimes. I am from so many places and so many things that it is hard to account for all of them at once. I do not know where home is yet. I know I feel it every time the wave of hot, humid air hits me getting off the plane at LAX, or when I see the first billboard in Spanish saying “Bienvenidos a México.” But I would tell you that home is in my mom’s embrace in the kitchen of my house while she cooks dinner, home in the chain with my name on it that hangs on my best friend's car’s rear-view mirror. Home in the dedication my dad leaves me in his published book, in my friends' Christmas parties and in car rides with my Nana to get food. So for now, home remains in the sureness of my heart.
Which stretches far more than 2,000 miles across this world.
With love, from home
Con amor, de mi corazón
Meztli Rosaherminia Hipolito
About the Author...
Meztli Hipolito is a junior at Denver School of the Arts. She is an award-winning poet and enjoys spending time with her family.
About the Artist...
Jandellyn Silvers-Lozano is a 12th grade Visual Artist at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts. Her ideal mediums are cardboard, fabric, and painting.