Storming Heaven's Gate/What Women Can Do

STORMING HEAVEN'S GATE -- photo by Graciela Iturbide

This is a multicultural anthology of spiritual writings by women. In rediscovering spirituality in a female context, this is ideal source material. By ‘source’ I mean personal soul food to feed my own yearnings, ground water for the wellspring of my daily life. Storming Heaven’s Gate skillfully bridges the everyday with the divine, featuring the writing of Pat Mora, Lucille Clifton, and Audre Lorde. I would like to comment specifically on the work of these women and its impact on my creative life.


Pat Mora’s contribution is a list poem, in which she invokes the Goddess through her many Aztec names. In a cry for wholeness and renewal she calls on Coatlicue, Tlaliyolo, and the Virgin de Tepayac/Guadalupe. Coatlicue is the serpent mother, representing all and nothingness from whence all emerges. Tlaliyolo is the creator/destroyer of worlds, and the Virgin of Tepeyac/Guadalupe is the eternal maiden, ever able to renew herself across the ages. The world springs forth, eats itself, springs forth again, dissolves itself in velvet blackness, and rises again, as one, as many, divine and common. These facets of the divine reflect exactly the kind of sensual, radiant cycle of spirituality that are the hallmark of Storming Heaven’s Gate.

Creatively and personally, I needed to engage the Goddess in a Latin context. In doing so, I found freedom from restrictive ideas of female identity that have been Catholicism's and colonialism's legacy. It is precisely the idea of sin, of the inherent pollution of women’s bodies, that had to be broken through for me to fully claim my creative energy and direct it.

As I continue to try to make new work, I have to reach out for connection in an ever-deepening way. My personal spirituality is being plumbed for imagery, for language, for a way to connect with something larger than myself.

Ironically, and in a way I can only begin to comprehend, this spiritual connection is plumbing me as well. What I mean here is that I can't forget that writing is my tether to something divine. Personal success, critical or audience acceptance needs to remain a secondary consideration, as much as care about those things. ‘What is being worked though me?’ is the question that I have to ask myself, the question that demands an answer at the end of the day.

In 'brothers, part 6,' Lucille Clifton cries out to a silent God who turns a deaf ear to suffering. She asks:

tell me why
in the confusion of a mountain
of babies stacked like cordwood...
tell me why You neither raised your hand
nor turned away...why You said nothing. (p.28)

I can feel my own tears lodge in my throat as I write this. What a terrible beauty exists in her description of both a personal and global apocalypse. Her wound, her grief, the abandoned bodies of nameless children, unsaved, unprotected.


Clifton asks the eternal question of a God she desperately wants connection with but does not understand. I remember my own rage at what I saw at the time as God's silence in the face of my own childhood abuse. I see now that what happened was part of my story unfolding, the catalyst for who I've become. It was a singular gift, a defining moment, in which I had to choose to live and to transform. In my case, that moment is where I encountered a God/Goddess.


Lastly, Audre Lorde illustrates the kind of language and imagery I can only hope to achieve someday. She was poet, theorist, theologian, lover, survivor, and griot - someone who once tore down the Master's house and built a temple to the New/Old Mother. One poem in particular kept speaking to me, even in dreams after I read it for the first time. In it, Lorde writes:

Attend me, hold me in you muscular arms, protect me
from throwing any part of myself away. (p.67)

How perfect this quote is, to its vision of encountering the very dark and moving into the light. How moving it is to hear a call to restoration and rebirth in a woman’s voice, shaped by She-Who-Is.

• ISBN-10: 0452276217

• ISBN-13: 978-0452276215

Lisa Alvarado

New Books From Children's Book Press

René Colato Laínez

Nana's Big Surprise/Nana, ¡Qué Sorpresa!
Story Amada Irma Pérez
Illustrations by Maya Christina Gonzalez

Amada and her family build a chicken coop, hoping their grandmother, visiting from Mexico, will enjoy raising the chickens and be distracted from her grief over their grandfather's death. From the Pura Belpré Honor award-winning team, comes an intergenerational tale of love, remembrance, and healing.

My Colors, My World
Mis colores, mi mundo
Written and illustrated by Maya Christina Gonzalez

Maya, who lives in the dusty desert, opens her eyes wide to find the color in her world, from Papi’s black hair and Mama’s orange and purple flowers to Maya’s red swing set and the fiery pink sunset.



On My Block
Edited by Dana Goldberg

Fifteen talented artists explore the places and spaces most special to them. This multicultural anthology is a celebration of community, an exploration of past and present, and an homage to neighborhoods everywhere.


Young Cornrows Callin Out the Moon
Story by Ruth Forman
Illustrations by Cbabi Bayoc

A celebration of city summers, sisterhood, and African American culture and community.




Kiki's Journey
Story by Kristy Orona-Ramirez
Illustrations by Jonathan Warm Day

When eight-year old Kiki travels to Taos Pueblo, the reservation where her parents grew up, she confronts her identity as both a Tiwa Indian and a big city girl.



A Place Where Sunflowers Grow
Story by Amy Lee-Tai
Illustrations by Felicia Hoshino

While she and her family are interned at the Topaz Relocation Center during World War II, Mari gradually adjusts as she enrolls in art class, makes a friend, plants sunflowers, and waits for them to grow.



Lakas and the Makibaka Hotel
Story by Anthony Robles
Illustrations by Carl Angel

Fun-loving Lakas takes readers on a new adventure, transforming one community’s struggle into a celebration of activism, spirit, and song.


The Closet Ghosts
Story by Uma Krishnaswami
Illustrations by Shiraaz Bhabha

Anu has ghosts in her closet! But a big move and a new home means more than just conquering her fears of the dark.



New in Paperback


A Movie in My Pillow / Una película en mi almohada
Story by Jorge Argueta
Illustrations by Elizabeth Gómez

A renowned Salvadoran poet recalls his experiences, dreams, and memories of his childhood in El Salvador and San Francisco.



The Upside Down Boy/El nino de cabeza
Story by Juan Felipe Herrera
Illustrations by Elizabeth Gómez

The author recalls the year when his farmworker parents settled in the city so that he could go to school for the first time.





i see the rhythm
Paintings by Michelle Wood
Text by Toyomi Igus

Beginning with the roots of black music in Africa and continuing on to contemporary hip hop, this visual and poetic chronicle is a celebration of the far-reaching impact African American music has had on the world.


Baby Rattlesnake
Told by Te Ata
Adapted by Lynn Moroney
Illustrated by Mira Reisberg

This hugely popular tale of family, love, and forgiveness, is now available in a paperback large-format English edition. With striking Santa Fe-style artwork, this Southwest Native American tale tells a story of family love and forgiveness.

Writing Multicultural Picture Books (Part 1)

René Colato Laínez

Prior to the 1960’s minority children could not find their own faces in picture books. The protagonists that they found were white children who did not reflect their heritage and did not speak their languages.

In 1975, Harriet Rohmer founded Children's Book Press. The San Francisco-based publisher was one of the first to offer bilingual and multicultural literature for the Hispanic children in the United States. Harriet was inspired to launch Children’s Book press after she enrolled her child in a bilingual day care center. Half of the children were from different Spanish-speaking countries; there were many African Americans, Native Americans and Asian Americans. She said in an interview with Children’s Writer:

"There were no role models. The typical book at a Head Start Center for young kids was ELOISE which takes place at New York’s Plaza Hotel, and that reality did not fit with any of the other kids at the center. Many of these children had come from migrant backgrounds, had come from rural areas in the South, had come from a completely different background than Eloise, and they were sort of looking and listening with blank faces. And it occurred to me that we really needed something different for our children. In part, I think there was the unspoken idea that books, particularly books for the very young, should be oriented to children of Europe’s roots."

In a workshop in the Reading the World Conference, Maya Christina Gonzalez illustrator of MY DIARY FROM HERE TO THERE/ MI DIARIO DE AQUÍ HASTA ALLÁ said:

"I have loved to draw and color for as long as I can remember. As a child I would go looking for my face in my coloring books, in my storybooks but I never found my round Chicana face, my long dark hair. So I would go to that blank page in the back or the front of these books and draw my own big face right there where it belonged."

The push for multicultural literature was a direct outgrowth of the Civil Rights movement in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. African Americans began the initial push, and then the movement was followed in the 1970s and 1980s by Latinos, Native Americans and Asian Americans.

During the 1970’s and 1980’s, more than 17 million immigrants entered the United States, more than double the number that had arrived during the four preceding decades. Most of these immigrants came from Latin American and Asian countries due to war, political persecution, famine and unemployment. Immigrant children attending public schools in California, Texas, New York and Florida found that books did not reflect their culture.


An Overview of Latino Multicultural Picture Books

In the 1970’s Children’s Book Press in California and Arte Público Press in Texas became the pioneers in multicultural bilingual publishing for the Latino community. These new books allowed immigrant children to honor their heritage, their native languages and helped reinforce their identities.

Due to the great demand for books for Spanish speakers, major publishing houses began to publish books for the Latino community. Authors of the dominant culture wrote these picture books. They based their writing on observation and research. Some of these picture books were accurate but most lacked authenticity and were full of stereotypes. Also these major publishing houses had been translating popular American books into Spanish. Unfortunately, these books reflected a non-Hispanic culture.
In the last decade most of the multicultural picture books published in the United States have come from authors of color. They base their writing on their own personal experiences. In these multicultural books, the authors, illustrators, characters, and plots echo the realities of the Latino Community. Now publishing houses are more open to multicultural picture books. They seize the opportunity to make books in which children from every background can see themselves. But can authors write picture books outside the culture? The answer is yes. However, to write an authentic multicultural picture book, there are a number of crucial elements that we need to take into consideration.

First, let’s see the kind of multicultural picture book formats that are being published in the United States.

Most large publishing houses publish multicultural picture book in English and then they sell their rights to other countries. The book is translated under other publishing house (MY NAME IS YOON, published in the United States by FSG. Reprinted in Spain under the title, ME LLAMO YOON).

On the other hand most small presses specializing in multicultural picture books prefer to do their books in a bilingual format (Children’s Book Press) or they publish two versions of the same book in English and another language, most often Spanish (Lee & Low). Some books combine many cultures within one book. Other books represent a particular ethnic group within a larger culture.

Some presses specifically look for books about a particular culture that are written by an author belonging to that culture (Arte Publico/Piñata Books), but most will consider any well-written, well-researched manuscript.

But what is a multicultural picture book? These are some definitions by some multicultural publishers.

Multicultural stories reflect the diversity and experiences of minority and/or new immigrant communities in the United States today. We publish picture books about contemporary life in the Latino/Chicano, African American, Asian American, Native American, multi-racial and other minority and new immigrant communities. Folktales are not the focus of our current publishing program. (Children’s Book Press)

Our goal is to meet the need for books that address children of color by providing fictional stories and informational books that all children can enjoy and which promote a greater understanding of one another. We are not considering folktales and animal stories. (Lee & Low Books)

Our multicultural mission is to create books that work to preserve Latin American culture in the United States; books that value the strong language heritage brought to our country by children from Latin America, and books that promote bilingualism and will expand a child's cultural knowledge and perspective. We are especially interested in themes that deal with the contemporary bicultural experience of living in the United States, and stories that feature contemporary Latin American role models. (Luna Rising).