Sonnet: The Madden Life. Tanzim Ahmed

My Madden life has drained my self-esteem.
With every loss I weep like a baby.
My opponent makes me cry in a scream.
Winning the game and then losing barely.
My career has vanished in the thick fog.
What should I do now, I feel very bad.
I am upset so I write this bad blog.
I know, I must beat this big sore wet lad.
Yes that is me, I am no longer free.
I must beat myself like they beat Tanzim.
Take that you scumbag, my sting's like a bee.
I go hard, so call me Tanzim Machine.
I just dominated you with a pow!
So next time, think before you call me cow.

Looking In Depth at the Poems of Martin Espada

          Martin Espada is a poet that can teach clear and meaningful lessons in his poems. He teaches the reader one similar lesson in the poems Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3, 1877, Revolutionary Spanish Lesson, and The New Bathroom Policy at English High School. The lesson that Espada teaches is to not discriminate against anybody. He also shows the reader the different levels of discrimination.

          The poem Revolutionary Spanish Lesson displays the lowest level of discrimination. The speaker of the poem is having his name mispronounced. After hearing this the speaker wants to, “…hijack a busload of Republican tourists from Wisconsin, force them to chant anti-American slogans in Spanish, and wait for the bilingual SWAT team to helicopter overhead, begging me to be reasonable.” It can be inferred that the person who has mispronounced the speaker’s name doesn’t take him seriously because he is different. The speaker feels like that he isn’t being respected like he should so he wants to do all the things such as hijacking a bus.

          The next level of discrimination is portrayed in The New Bathroom Policy at English High School. The principal of English High School is sitting in a stall and overhears a group of Latino students talking in Spanish. He doesn’t understand what they are saying but he does hear his name in their discussion. Inferences can be made that the principal thinks that they are talking badly about him. Due to this he bans Spanish in the bathrooms. Espada wrights the poem so greatly that he leaves the reader thinking. The principal is discriminating against those kids and the school’s Spanish community by banning Spanish. He doesn’t take time to try to learn the language or even try to ask the boys what they were saying. He doesn’t have any patience with the boys and their language. The principal in this case is violating the U.S Constitution by not letting them speak Spanish. The boys were talking in the bathrooms, not in the classrooms when a class is in session. They had full rights to speak Spanish, the principal took away their freedom of speech and thought it didn’t matter because they were Latino. He didn’t give them the respect that they deserved and in turn lost the respect of those students.

          Out of all the three poems, Espada displays the highest level of discrimination in Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3, 1877. After the two Mexicanos were hung, the speaker says, “…a high-collar boy smirking, some peering from the shade of bowler hats, but all crowding into the photograph.” This line of the poem can make the reader think about how much the vigilantes hate the two Mexicanos. It can also make them think about why the vigilantes killed the Mexicanos. The discrimination can be understood by the reaction of the vigilantes. If a person were to read this poem, they would need to know a little background information on that time period. During the mid to late 1800’s, African Americans and many different races of people were being discriminated against and lynched. Many of these people committed small mistakes. Unfortunately, the white people used these mistakes as an excuse to hang them. Those people killed two men for committing a microscopic crime. This is the biggest level of discrimination.

          In conclusion, the reader can understand the different ways of discrimination. The levels of discrimination can be something as simple as mispronouncing someone’s name to killing someone because they are a different race, or religion. Discrimination is still a big issue today. People terrorize other people just because of their race, religion, or sexuality. This needs to come to an end quickly. Everyone in this planet is the same, no matter how different they may be.