Ancestors

Pieces in this section bring together the author’s ancestors of blood and of spirit: from ancient ancestors like the African woman whose DNA we all share, and the earliest occupants of the Americas, the voices of the dead that underlie the past five hundred years of Boricua history, the freedwomen of Puerto Rico, Jewish and Puerto Rican garment workers of New York, the Puerto Rican and Mexican waterfront workers of the San Francisco Bay, and the murdered children of Nazi-occupied Ukraine and Israeli-occupied Palestine. Even more specifically, there are pieces about Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Muna Lee, Fidel Castro, and Filiberto Ojeda Ríos; one each about the author’s mother, Rosario Morales, and father, Richard Levins; and one about them both.