FLORICANTO ISSUE Hedy Treviño   A POEM DEDICATED TO MY GRANDFATHER JOSÉ GARCÍA To those that came before to those that were confronted by storefront windows signs that read no Mexicans or dogs allowed   I placed his walking stick into the ground I waved his walking stick toward the moon  To those that came from the other side of the mountain  To the ancient ones that never spoke English that never carried a drivers license I shutter to think how you would be treated today in Arizona  I remember the lanterns The ringing of the bells The river flutes  In the moon light I see your face that face of abuelito the gentle one with the big beautiful brown hands weathered from working the land  He never sat in a movie theatre he never walked on stage he never wrote a poem yet his very life was a poem  The man who taught me to kneel and ask the rivers permission before crossing   The man who scattered cracked corn to replenish the dens of mice and to feed the deer whose winter supply of food we had stolen when we gathered pinon nuts  When you take from the earth you put back an offering When you take from the earth you put back an offering he would say.  Those simple seemingly insignificant deeds The lessons learned and yet he raised me an orphan child The child of his child whom he took to his hearth  The people that could stop a dangerous storm cloud with the wave of a hand to the people that understood the call of the owl  To the people that could cure with herbs roots and flowers  They understood the seasonal arrival of the birds, moths, and butterflies he understood the significance of their flight plans, the direction from which they arrived and what it meant for the harvest  They understood that the density of foliage upon the trees predicted the intensity of winter storms  They had survived the depression they had had survived the common hangings and repatriations of Mexicans in the 1940's  These were the people of the corn the children of the man god that could fly  Over there from the other side of the mountain he would say when as a small child I would ask where we came from  The man who knew where the buffalo herds were slaughtered... the man who whittled me magic flutes from river willows  And yet he raised me an orphan child     Hedy Treviño has written poetry since the age of eight. Her first poem came as a result of being punished for speaking Spanish in school. Her poetry has been published in numerous journals and she has performed her poetry at numerous cultural events. She continues to write poetry, and inspires others to use the written word as a form of self discovery and personal healing. Treviño is moderator and one of the founding members of Poets Responding to SB 1070.   Published in Volume 13, Number 1, Winter 2012.