Citizen Illegal and On My Mom’s 50th Birthday
In this compare and contrast essay, I will be comparing “Citizen Illegal” and “On my mom’s 50th birthday” by Jose Olivarez. In both of these poems, we will be discussing that no matter where our roots are from at the end of the day we are all the same and nothing should make a difference between us, we will also explain the differences between the two poems. Both of the poems are about the Mexican culture and how everything changes having Mexican parents and you are a citizen or vice versa, in other words, it's about racism.
Culture
Both short poems, “Citizen Illegal” and “On my mom’s 50th birthday” share a good, bad, Mexican culture between poems. In “Citizen Illegal” shows a bad culture when we start reading the poem and analyzing that some Mexican parents have a citizen baby that will change his life the way the parents decide to race the baby. The author tries to show us the horrific scene of racism that we infer from the description given in the last few sentences where the way the baby is being race defined in some way if the baby is a citizen or illegal if the boy’s nickname is Guerito (citizen). If the boy attends college (citizen). If the boy only dates women (illegal) (Olivarez pg.3). This helps the reader understand the motivation they are giving to the baby through life not knowing that it can affect the baby emotionally and mentally in the future. In “On my mom’s 50th birthday”, we can see the culture by the way the main character is giving to her mom the day off from home and not let her stress for having food ready for her children and husband because it’s the mom’s birthday all she wants is for her mom to have fun. Usually, that is what every Mexican family does for others on their birthdays, letting the birthday person do nothing just have fun on their day. This poem consists of just making someone special happy, so for the next few hours she will not worry about me and my brothers, so for the next few hours, all she will have to worry about is the color of her lips (Olivarez pg.23).
https://family.lovetoknow.com/family-values/mexican-family-culture
Motivation
The motivation behind both stories incorporates the idea of family, the character from “On my mom’s 50th birthday” is making everything possible for her mom to go and celebrate her birthday without worry about the things in the house “my mom and placing her in a club in Guadalajara with her sisters and sisters are as close to love as she wants to be right now” (pg.23), giving her mom the best day. The daughter, however, not only she is not giving her mom the day, but she is being a mom for the children. This type of motivation is what mothers need from their children to give them a little thank you for doing and being there when they need a friend.
Communication
On the other hand, in these two poems communication is what brings a good and healthy relationship between parents and children. On the “Citizen Illegal” the parents will make the best decisions for their child and no one else should interfere. On the other side “On my mom’s 50th birthday,” the author shows us that the girl has great communication with her family just by making her mom special and decide to give her mom the day off from home.
This quote relates a lot with both poems in we may not be the same physically but we are the same just by being humans and no matter what our roots are from we should all have the same respect. Both poems have the same situation of being Mexican but living in another country with a different culture that on “Citizen Illegal” in some part of the baby’s life would be hard because of racisms, and they will consider him illegal just by having illegal parents.
