It’s astounding when you look at it from below or from the distance. The Salesforce tower is the tallest building in San Francisco. Before it’s inception, it was the TransAmerica Pyramid Center. Buildings like this not only show off their height, but also the power behind them. It’s easy to forget that these are an extension for corporations, and everything they stand for.
15 years ago, my father and I walked down Market street of San Francisco, accidentally bumping into morning commuters, smelling the freshly brewed coffee from mom and pop shops when many of them were still around. He had a meeting with an immigration lawyer, one that had an office on the 31st floor of the building I can’t seem to recall as an adult. I’m almost 30 and have seen many skyscrapers in my life but at around 13, it felt amazing to press “31” on the elevator buttons.
I said, “Dad, it goes even higher than this!”
“Isn’t it cool?” He said, genuinely happy at my excitement. “It goes even higher than that. Maybe you’ll work in an office like this when you’re my age.”
Before we entered the building, signed in at the front desk, we took photos of the skyscrapers with our new camera phones and made them our background.
Mom and dad had been working multiple jobs to afford our new house, one that they had bought with their own labor, working day and night for almost six years to save enough money for the down payment. When there was a little bit of money left, they splurged and got the three of us phones.
American Dream: Sueño Americano, is what they called it.
When we get to the lawyer’s office, we wait until it’s our turn. It’s always people that look like us, not in the ethnicity but in the anxiety that they carry on their faces. They try to hide it: a mix of almost always failing, a mix of hope and uncertainty in uncertain times after 9/11.
ICE, Immigration and Customs enforcement was founded on March 1st, 2003. When word got out of what was looming in the distance, many immigrants, both documented and undocumented flooded law offices, making sure that their status was in order, that they had nothing that would target, or, in the case of my father, see if there was a way to get a status.
One does not always fear limbo until limbo slowly turns to hell.
The lawyer’s answer is always the same.
“I’m sorry. There is no way to status for a client such as yourself. I can give you brochures to your consulate as they do make an ID that’s accepted in banks. Here’s a Know Your Rights card to keep in your wallet at all times,” The lawyer, whose language is almost, word by word, the same as those who have come before.
“Are you sure? Like 100 percent?” My dad asks. Today, like all the others days, he hoped that the news would be different, that all the no’s that came before would be erased and that there would finally be something for him. “I have kids that have been born here, I’ve paid my taxes, I’ve never had any bad run in’s with cops and…” He says before the lawyer cuts him off.
“I know you’ve heard some stories from friends and maybe family. But each case is different and they might not be telling you all the whole picture. Many notarios also commit fraud to get someone a work permit and a work permit is not a green card. Thank you for coming and I know you’re terrified, but please, never, ever go to a notario,” The man says with a tiny smile, trying to keep his demeanor consistent.
I am 13 and I’m my dad’s translator for this. This would be the 12th attempt in seeking a status. It would also not be the last.
Dad knows people who went the route of notarios. Many of them had no idea of the fraud behind many of their applications by the tiny storefronts, usually tucked away in strip malls close to immigrant communities. He told me once, of a friend, someone he had to know for years that worked with him and also played for the soccer team he coached, that he and his family went ahead with a fraudulent application. They knew the risks, knew that the would eventually get caught but not after many years, maybe even a decade.
He warned his friend and asked him why would he take such a risk, why not wait it out like every other family was doing.
His friend didn’t blink, didn’t try to pepper it with flowery language of hope or anything like that. His friend said, “For my family, I’m willing to take the chance. Nothing is promised, but I’ll risk everything for them.”
This isn’t an essay on the sacrifice of my parents. I have too many of those testimonies in my poetry and fiction. This is an essay of sacrifice, what families will do and what individual often choose not to do.
In past few years, we’ve seen a surge of families and children making their way to United States border with Mexico. In 2018, we became enraged at the fact that hundreds of children had been separated from their parents at the border. At the time of this writing, a little over 500 children are still not with their parents.
The response was huge on my facebook page, with friends marching, writing poetry, donating money. I work and curate as an artist in the San Francisco Bay Area, with the majority of my page full of friends who are also writers/artists. Any given day I can look at profiles of friends and look at their values, what they support, the articles they intend to bring awareness and also, their careers. Writers will post their readings, their new books, their residencies and more.
I am very happy for them when they post these things. It’s always great to see others that hustle in the same industry making moves and getting those book deals and residencies where they can work on their craft.
In a few weeks, a majority of the Bay Area lit scene will descend to San Francisco to participate at Litcrawl, the yearly event created by Litquake.
Litquake has events outside of their major Litcrawl event. There are readings at Yerba Buena Center, and now, at Salesforce park.
When employees and the public called on the company and Marc Benioff, it’s CEO to cut its ties to ICE, Benioff responded in a tweet:
“I stand against separating children from their parents & implore the govt to enact humane immigration legislation that keeps families together. You shall always love thy neighbor as thyself. LV 19:18 MT 22:39 His love does has no borders. His love is between every mother & child.”
As of this writing, Salesforce is still supplying software for immigration enforcement.
As of this writing, Litquake is still working with Salesforce.
As of this writing, most of my friends on facebook are still supporting Litquake. They’ll be reading at events, others curating, the majority will be attending multiple events.
When I read for Litquake two years ago, I was able to meet people, make connections, and more. It’s free exposure and for writers, exposure is everything. The first time a stranger said they were a fan of my work was the day where I started to chip away at the imposter syndrome that had been plaguing me since my MFA days.
Why wouldn’t I want this for everyone else?
In two years I’ve done a lot of growing. I’m a faculty member in Ethnic Studies at a university and in that time, I’ve become more an activist. I no longer let microaggressions go, and for the 1st time in my life am advocating constantly for people of color and immigrant communities. Communities Salesforce is hurting, communities writers say they support.
At the start of the semester, I asked students in my senior seminar, “How do we make change?”
The answers were honest, progressive and also powerful. It’s all about numbers and support. A single act goes a long way in sentiment but it’s large numbers that make the difference. I am protesting Litquake and their connection with Salesforce, I am not protesting my friends or their art. I am standing up to what is right because I owe my father and each student in my class this action of protest.
It is through bodies not attending, bodies in protest, and loss of revenue that large organizations feel the vice that is the people’s power, a power that is often taught isn’t useful.
I’m calling on artists and writing communities to look at their values and ask themselves if advancing a career is worth more than immigrant communities of color.
When I was ten, my father told me that it was my duty to do all that I could to get into a good school and make as much money as I could. If he could vote, I’m sure he’d vote libertarian. Growing up poor, seeing what we didn’t have, it was easy to point at everything that was fame and success and say “Do that, that’s the dream”
I chose the life of a writer, an artist, and a professor. If I still carried that flame by dad taught me and followed through on his advice, I’d be working at the easiest six-figure industry to enter, to further my station and economic status.
But I choose to do something different, something that isn’t only about me, I choose my community and to serve those who came after me, that worry about their parents, their own status and the sentiment that many in the United States have for people of color and undocumented immigrants.
My student last week broke down in my office, admitting that her DACA status was close to lapsing and she didn’t have the funds. I did everything in my power to make sure she could renew her DACA. I did all that I could for her and when the lawyer mailed out her pocket she emailed me, thanked me and said, “I didn’t know people cared about immigrants other than their facebook posts.”
This hit me, how easy it is to share an article, but how hard it is to have followed through and participated in protest and activism. If I could send this to me two years ago, I’m not certain if I’d take my own advice.
I think to my friends and people within my circle, the writing they do and how they need this event, need events like these. I know opportunities are too few and competitive.
But as I navigate through life as a writer and artist, I must always default to the thought of my student who could lose her status anytime, to the children separated from their parents and to my father who refuses to give up on the hope that some relief may come up for immigrants like him.
I’m mindful and I protest, because of them.
