Poetry
Mujer Migrante Memorial is registered with the Writers Guild of America, West, Inc. #2119408]
Mujer Migrante Memorial (MMM) is a virtual and “real” urban art installation conceived and created by Maha Benhachmi, Eliza Franklin-Edmondson, Miranda Hirujo-Rincón, Xiuwen Qi, Cristina Vázquez, and Maite Zubiaurre/Filomena Cruz, in productive dialogue with our interlocutors, the Tijuana-based Art and Film Collective Dignicraft (José Luis Figueroa, Omar Foglio, and Ana Paola Rodríguez). It is a memorial that honors female migrants and mourns their death in the Southern Arizona border (Pima County), and is meant to raise awareness about migrant death in the US-Mexico borderlands.
MMM includes a virtual component and a “real” installation.
1. Virtual component
MMM has a virtual component housed on the ArcGIS platform. It includes
a) an extensive and ongoing narrative on female migrant death in the Southern Arizona desert;
b) a poem in homage of deceased female migrants composed in English by Eliza Franklin-Edmondson, translated into Spanish and in the process of being translated into a number of indigenous languages spoken in the communities and countries of origin of female migrants; and
c) a “thick” map by Xiuwen Qi that registers the exact geo-spatial location of the 389 female migrant remains recovered as of May of 2021. The map also registers a) the age of the deceased female migrants; and b) distinguishes between “identified” and “unidentified” remains.
Cross representing one of the female migrants during installation
Eliza Jane Franklin is the author of "Her," a poem in English that honors the lives of female migrants and mourns their death in the Southern Arizona desert. The Mujer Migrante Memorial project is one in which Eliza Jane was able to use her gift of spoken word to speak to the human problem of migrant death. She was personally impacted by the stories when she went to visit the sites in the desert where some of the women had lost their lives. If you would like to hear other translations of the poem or learn more about the project, click the button below.
HER
(by Eliza Franklin)
Mujer, Madre, Tía, Hija, Esposa
She is a legal citizen
Crossing the illegal fronteras
Returning home across the stolen
Lands of her antepasadas
His ancestors are European
Her ancestors, sus antepasadas, are mexicanas, salvadoreñas, guatemaltecas, and indígenas.
Her is she, the one who was bold enough to grab the border deserts by the cojones
And lead her own pathway to an uncertain futuro
Transported through the middle of en ningún lugar
By the dinero hambriento of the coyotes
No better than the gringos and border patrol
Whose voices echo in the desert air
Where are your papers
dónde están sus papeles
She is a documented refugiada
They are documented refugiadas
Carrying their papeles
Their proof is that they are who they are
algunas fotografías (some photographs), identificaciones
Resting in the back pocket of their weathered jeans as
Cold Feet shift the pantufla de alfombra towards their antepasadas home
In the cover of dark desert nights
They reply
dónde están sus papeles
Where are your papers
Sons and daughters of the gringo colonizers
Hiding behind border walls
You are descendants of cobardes
They are descendientes of fuerza
Forever propelling us to the uncertain futuros
Crossing the illegal fronteras
Returning home across the stolen
Lands of their antespasadas
Counting the days of our journey to cross over
For some of them it turns into
A día de los muertos
Yet, No matter the outcome
It is a celebración of the life, lives, and those that lived
Who were, was, and are
Whose soul can never be destruida
porque siempre serán
Mujer, Madre, Tía, Hija, Esposa