Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Missing the poetry and the poets

Healing Earthquakes...probably my favorite works of Jimmy Santiago Baca. Please take time to listen to the first or last ten minutes or so when you have time...it's Baca reading a portion in the first ten minutes from Healing Earthquakes which I posted back in September or in the last ten minutes, the piece titled 'Healing Earthquakes".


After that bookstore meeting, I couldn't help but write about the experience and decided to post it on my MYSPACE blog...one of my pieces, I believe that was inspired.

Working in juvenile detention I used to be surrounded by poetry and poets - often silent and waiting...for eruption, for expression, or immersed in words of truth and pain and intimacy that allows one to make an attempt to live, to reach in and then out, to heal, to be understood. I believe this poem below does just that. Thank you Rene Aguiluz for this verbal interpretation of Baca's "Who Knows Me But Me".

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Vestiges of Fall fading fast...

Yes! Yesterday Omaha, Nebraska
received the first snow of this winter season!

So this is me...just reminiscing
about what's soon to be a distant memory.
Pumpkin carvings extraordinaire!
What my room mates do with their spare time!
Really!! These pumpkin carvings were amazing!
My camera could not do them justice at all!

Placed strategically on the porch Halloween night,
the pumkins delighted the "costume partiers".

I don't usually don't "do Halloween" but I was home alone
and left with explicit instructions by my two room mates
to "pass out the candy!"
So I did as I was told, since they weren't yet home
(...conveniently, or so I thought).

What amazed me was that I heard only one
"costumed character" utter the words "trick or treat".
I'm thinking that "trick or treat" is out
and just "being cute or scary-seen but speechless" must be in.

Things that make you go hmmm..
.-in more ways than one!

It's amazing what people (alive or dead)
will find to do with their spare time.

According to my brother, OJ...I guess Utica was visited by
a lone zombie on Halloween
walking the streets after dark,
witnessed by many, scared the heck out of some.
(Identity still unknown,
but then I'm thinking it's not unusual for zombies
to remain anonymous)

Oooo...CREEPY!

Relocated to where?!? O!

I'm now living in Omaha, Nebraska.
I'll leave the story about why I left Albuquerque for another post.

Occasionally Michelle and I have been able to go for walks together...
whether it's downtown or just in the neighborhood,
the weather's been sensational and ideal for being in the outdoors!

I wondered why Michelle was toting along a bag of crackers.
And here I thought maybe Michelle was just prepared
for a lengthy stroll or hike. Silly me!

Michelle is out of crackers...but this little guy or girl is waiting patiently...
and seems to understand intuitively
the potential power of "making eye contact".
Poor little one!

We both felt bad that we didn't have more to feed em,
they seemed so hungry. But there was so many of them

and well...I guess...didn't Jesus say "the poor will always be with us"?

Whoops! A little larger crowd to dinner than anticipated!

I was amazed at the coloring on these flock...
quite a variety too!

Doing what I do...
enjoying the out of doors!

A path in metro Omaha near Stinson Park

There are various walking paths for the choosing...

This walk is Michelle's favorite...the river walk in downtown Omaha
I've given up the mountains (for now) but not the water...
and that Missouri River is one large body of water.

The River Walk along the Missouri River
Downtown Omaha

Getting used to the time change.
I can't believe it gets dark by 5:30pm now.
It feels so early...for a night owl anyway.
Sights of downtown Omaha - O!

Seasons Quickly Passing

Vestiges of fall

Is winter really just around the corner?
A walk through the park

Little beauty!
Nothing like something white, wet and cold to break a fall reverie!
pic taken Saturday, November 13, 2010
The snow started falling Friday evening about 5:30pm.
First snow this "coming winter" season.
The heavy wet slushy stuff-
perfect for making snowmen, but their lives will be short-lived,
because the snow is melting fast!
I believe I have arrived in a cooler climate!

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Storytelling on Sunday - Storyteller: Jimmy Santiago Baca

I remember in my younger days, sitting around the table after dinner, listening to my father tell stories and talk about his childhood and growing up. His stories were quite interesting, but back then I was so absorbed with my own life as a teen and pretty much focused on my own rapidly approaching freedom and future. Now my memories of the exact details of his stories are so fuzzy, and so thinking back to those moments, what I wouldn't given to have somehow frozen those stories in time or to have taken the time to write them down! How many personal stories are left untold or unrecorded?
As I've begun to make attempts at recording other's stories, I've learned some hard and painful lessons about hearing and recording the stories of storytellers. I've found that when hearing a person's untold stories, particularly if it is someone you think you know well, you may experience thoughts and emotions towards the person that are unexpected. I've learned it is imperative that one listen and write the stories told without judging the storyteller. Once a storyteller offers to bare their soul, you must enter that space with respect and humility, lest the stories be locked up or lost for a lifetime. The storyteller, I highlight this Sunday, often speaks of such reference and humility towards others, himself, and the earth's inhabitants in his own storytelling.
I am easily mesmerized by colorful storytellers as I find my own storytelling so matter of fact. It takes a certain frame of mind, knack or skill to tell a story in a way that leaves the listener spellbound. There is one such storyteller who calls Albuquerque his home...Jimmy Santiago Baca. I've been reading and sharing his works since 2007, mostly with young people in detention. I just recently had the chance to meet him and what an opportunity! Meeting one of my favorite poets/storytellers face to face! The following piece is one example of Mr. Baca's work....



Tire Shop

I went down yesterday to fix a leak in my tire.
Off Bridge Street, there's a place 95 cents, flats fixed.
Smeary black paint on warped wood plank between two bald tires.
I go in, an old black man with a Jackie Gleason hat greasy soft
with a mashed cigar stub in mouth and another old Chicano man
working the other pneumatic hissing tire changer.
The walls are black with soot, brown black dust everywhere
and rows of worn tires on gnawed board racks for sale,
air hoses snaking and looped over the floor.
I greet the two old men, "yeah! how's it going?" No response.
They look up at me as if I just gave them a week to live.
"I got a tire needs a tube." Rudy, a young chicano,
emerges from the black part of the room, pony-tailed and plump,
walks me out to my truck and looks at the tire.
"It'll cost you five bucks to take off and change." I nod.
He tells the old Chicano who pulls the roller jack
with the long steel handle outside, and I wait
in the middle of the grunting oval tire changing machines,
while the old guy goes out and returns with my tire.
He looks like a disgruntled Carny handling the Ferris wheel
for the millioneth time, and I'm just another ache in the arm,
a spoiled kid. I watch the two old men work the tire machines
step on the foot levers that send the bars around
flipping the tire from the rim and I wonder
what brought these two old men to work here
on this grey evening in February-
are they ex-cons? Drunks or addicts?
He whips the tube out. "Rudy", he yells,
and I see a gaping hole in the tube. "Can't patch that", Rudy says.
Then in Spanish slang says, "No podemos pachiarlo."
"We got a pile of old tubes over there,
we'll do it for ten dollars." At first I think he might be taking me
but I hedge away from the thought and watch the machines work
the spleesh of air, the final begrudging phoof! of rubber popped loose
then the holy clank of steel bar against steel and ever gently
the old Chicano man, instead of throwing the bar on the floor
takes the iron bar and wipes it clean of rubber bits and oil
and slides it gently into his waist belt in such a way
I've only seen mothers wipe their infant's mouth.
And I wonder where they live, these two old guys
I turn and watch MASH on a tv suspended from the ceiling
6 o'clock news comes on, Hunnington Beach blackened with oil.
Rudy comes behind me and says,

"F**ing shame they do that to our shores."
I suddenly realize how I love these working men, working in half dark
with bald tires, like medieval hunchbacks in a dungeon.
They eat soup and scrape along in their lives,
how can they live,

I wonder, on 95 cents a tire change in today's world?
I am pleased to be with them and feel how barrio Chicanos
love this too-how some give up nice jobs in foreign places
to live by friends working in these places and out of these men
revolutions have started. The old Chicano is mumbling at me
how cheap I am, when he learns my four tires are bald and spare flat,
shaking his head as he works the tire into the tire well.
I notice his heels are chewed to the nails and his fingernails
are black, his face a weary room and board stairwell
of a downtown motel given over to drunks and derelicts,
his face hand worn by drunks leaning their full weight on it
wooden steps grooved by hard soled men, just out of prison
a face condemned by life to live out more days in futility.
I bid goodbye to the black man chomping his ancient cigar
the Chicano man with head down and I feel ashamed,
somehow, that I cannot live their lives a while for them.
Grateful they are here, I respect such men, who have stories
that will never be told, who bring back to me my simple boyish days
when men in oily pants and grubby hands talked in rough tones
and worked at simple work, getting three meals a day on the table
the hard way. They live in an imperfect world
unlike men with money who have places to put their shame,
these men have none.
Others put their shame on planes or Las Vegas
These have no place but to put their shame on their endurance,
their mothers, their kids, themselves,
unlike men who put their shame on new cars, condos, bank accounts
so they never have to face their shame.
These men in the tire shop have become more human with shame.
And I thought of the time my brother betrayed me, leaving me at 14
when he vowed we'd always be together. He left to live with some
rich folks, and I was taken to the Detention center for kids
with no place to live I became a juvenile filled with anger
at my brother who left me alone. These tire shop men
made choices, never to leave their brothers, in them
I saw shame with no place to go, but in a man's face, hands,
work and silence. As I drove away, nearing my farm
I saw a water sprinkler shooting an arc of water far over
the fence and grass it was intended to water-the fountain hitting
a weedy stickered spot that grew the only single flower anywhere
around in the midst of rubble, brush and stones.
The water hit and touched a dormant seed that blossomed
all itself into what it was despite the surroundings.
Something made sense to me then and I'm not quite sure what -
an unconditional love of being and living
and taking what came one's way with dignity.
That night in my dream I cried for my brother as he was leaving
all the words I used against myself, rotten, no good, shitty, failure
dissolved in my tears. My tears poured out of me in my dream
and I wept for my brother and wept when I turned after he left
and I reached for my sister and she was having coffee with a friend
I wept in my dream because she was not available for me
when I needed her, and all my tears flowed and how I wept
my feeling, my pain of abandonment, all my tears became
that arc of water and I became the flower, by sheer accident
in the middle of nowhere, blossoming...

Jimmy Santiago Baca

Friday, August 20, 2010

Friday Prime Time Spotlight: San Francisco

Here it is...

3 of my favorite spotlights on San Francisco...

SAN FRANCISCO!! WOW!

IT'S ALL THERE!

VISIONARIES IN ACTION,

POWERFULLY EFFECTIVE PROGRAMS

AND VOICES WORTH LISTENING TO!!!

GOTTA LOVE IT!

#1 Delancy Street

Delancy Street and Dr. Mimi Silbert...I have known about this program for about 5 years or so now...this program just blows me away!

Incredible impact and hope for people who are at the end of their rope!





#2 The Beat Within

Ming Toy Lee speaking about events in her life...this young lady has a long history with The Beat Within...speaking to the powerful positive difference this program has on young people caught up by negative influences on the streets and challenged to be more, do more of what's positive and avoid the negative that keeps one in a cycle of violence and incarceration.


#3 Train and Patrick Monahan

Wow! Patrick Monahan! Love that voice! Here's When I Look To The Sky with Train...


(Maybe this town will be my next destination in about 5 or so years! =)

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Storytelling on Sunday - A photographic journey

Mural on 2nd St. and Copper in downtown Albuquerque
My first exposure to wall art in New Mexico 2009

August 2009 ... arrived in Albuquerque by bus and began my trek across the downtown area to my rental car location about 4 blocks away. This was about 7:00am and the streets seemed to be somewhat deserted, except for cars and a few scattered wanderers, like myself.

I was on my way to Santa Fe and Taos to take photos of murals and take in "artistic atmosphere". As I wheeled my luggage along the streets towards my destination, I discovered wall art all around me. I ended up taking photos of 5 murals in a half hour, right there in Albuquerque. I was intrigued.

Graffiti art across the road from my hotel...
glad I took the photos when I did as they no longer exist...
new photos have taken their place.

I soon found out that wall art was a norm along Route 66 and definitely got swept up in the glory of it all. Photo after photo, and I was hooked.

Wall art on Nob Hill in UNM area, Route 66

As I was saying my plan for August 9th and 10th, 2009 in New Mexico was actually to spend the majority of my time in Santa Fe and Taos, but I found myself caught up in the art scene in Albuquerque and had little desire to leave. Finally Albuquerque had gotten my attention, once again.

All up and down Route 66/Central I traveled taking photo after photo in the UNM/Nob Hill area. I liked the town, the weather (which was hot in the day, but cool in the evenings in August) and the art. I could not get over all the art. Wow! Compared to Phoenix, this town seemed to celebrate its wall artists.

It seemed Albuquerque had a hand in rearranging my plans this trip. Who would have imagined that 23 years later we'd have so many interests in common? Hmmmm...the wheels started turning and continued, even after I boarded the bus to head back to my Phoenix home...

Mural on Warehouse 21-a youth art center in Santa Fe

Rio Grande Gorge near Taos, New Mexico 2009

Oh, and by the way, I did eventually get to northern New Mexico in 2009, but my trip to Santa Fe and Taos was somewhat inconsequential and not quite what I had planned. Once I got north of Albuquerque, my attention turned to the outdoors. By this point I found my mind was saturated with art, and so I was content to just hang out along the Rio Grande and take photos of the beautiful surroundings. I don't know what it is, but there is just something about me and rivers.

Rio Grande River, north of Santa Fe

It is hard to believe that last August I was simply visiting and now just a year later I actually reside in Albuquerque, New Mexico. But then I'm not totally surprised, because Albuquerque has been beckoning to me since 1986. And I'm starting to think she remembers that I spurned her initial open invitation to me...so many years ago.

Here's the story of what happened...

Yes! Back in 1986 - 1987 I had strongly considered moving to Albuquerque. My intention in the summer of 1987 was to help out at Cross Bar X Youth Ranch in Durango, Colorado during drama camp and then move to Albuquerque. I had worked as a counselor at Cross Bar X the summer of 1986. This event had made such a significant impact on my life and at the time I had a strong desire to continue working with Cross Bar X. They were planning (or already had in place, can't remember which) an outreach and ministry to kids in Albuquerque, like the one they already had in Denver. It seemed like an exciting opportunity, as I wanted to work with others in a camp/ranch ministry.

But I really didn't have the finances to follow this dream on my own, and so after a reality check by my father about my financial situation, I resigned to do the right thing and move back to my parents' home after college. Back to Nebraska I went and as I got caught up in life as a twenty-something, Albuquerque, New Mexico became just a fond memory. Whether this decision was motivated out of obedience or fear or lack of faith, I do not know, but I do know the impact of that decision set the course of my life up to this very day.

It seems somewhat ironic that finances played a major role in my decision to abandon my plans to move to Albuquerque in 1987, and now in 2010 (23 years later) finances have finally allowed me to follow these earlier "imaginings" with a totally different motivation in my heart and mind.

Maybe I'm paying for the fact that I ignored her earlier calls in my direction, and then chose Phoenix instead (motivated by love/friendship and immaturity) when I had the chance to strike out and settle in the Southwest. Maybe Albuquerque couldn't help but notice that I abandoned her for another once again. And it didn't take long for me to fall in love with Arizona. Most likely my extended stay in Phoenix made that fact apparent. Really I had pretty much put Albuquerque out of my heart and mind until that fateful visit last August.


So my bubble, of a new start in this artistic destination (with the mountains to boot), may soon burst, if I am unable to survive this current employment climate and land a position somewhere. I don't really want to think that I may have to leave, but it seems a possibility.

Well what can I expect? I thought she'd would be "keen" to see me, but instead I've experienced a surprising amount of aloof indifference since arriving here (most evident to me in the area of job hunting). It's almost like Albuquerque's saying "So?!!" You show up after all this time and want me to welcome you with open arms?! Hmmph! Well I just don't know!" Sometimes you cannot convince a place or person you deserve a second (or maybe it's a third) chance when "feelings of distant rejection" (may) linger.

I can only hope the penance will soon end, and the town of Albuquerque will find it in her heart to forgive me and accept me as one of her own. I may have to put in lots of extra effort to convince her I really do want to stay and that I'm not on the rebound! (...lol...)


I hope to someday soon visit both Santa Fe and Taos again, along with a host of others destinations here in New Mexico. There's Roswell, Ruidoso, and Carlsbad Caverns, and the White Sands National Monument...just to mention a few.

Now that I'm finally here, I realize there is lots of wonderful potential. With so many interesting places to explore, and decent people and myriads of opportunities just under the surface, I'm surely hoping I get the chance to stay and contribute. But one can't force a new beginning, sometimes the seeds don't grow for a variety of reasons. I guess ultimately there's gotta be the "right" timing and an open heart for opportunities to present themselves to a willing hand. Right now I'm thinking the next 3 months will hold the answer to whether I've found a home or I'm just passing through.

I have scattered photos throughout this post of my 2009 trip to New Mexico. Enjoy!

Friday, August 13, 2010

Behold! Creative, therapeutic outpourings!

When David Inocencio and the Beat Within staff came to Durango in 2003, they shared this writing with us. Though the name of the author was not given, this piece speaks for itself.

A Sound Silence

When you read this

Realize I’m not asking for pity.

But I’m trying to share my experience

As I experience it.

The most influential person in my life

is no more.

And it is because of his death

that he has influenced me so much.

I didn’t want what happened

to happen .

And I could’ve never imagined

that it would happen.

After the death,

My emotions were numb,

I couldn’t think straight,

Eat a meal,

Or even sleep at night.

I would close my eyes

and have images of the night he died

pass through my head,

and I would remember everything so vividly

that I felt it was happenening right there and then.

When I did sleep,

My dreams

were only reenactments

of the night I’d wake up sweating,

Panting,

And sometime calling for him

as he died in my hands.

That is an experience that will never leave me,

The loss of human life in front of your eyes

In your arms.

Watching the last breath seep from the lips

And having no idea that this painful moment

would be relived countless times

throughout the rest of my life.

It seems that my experience

has made me realize life's fragility

It’s abrupt turns

And its sudden ends.

I now have to make the most

of every moment

Even though my life doesn’t seem worth living anymore.

I don’t feel my experience would be different

to anyone who saw those ten minutes of my life.

Who saw those ten minutes go by a blink of a eye,

But at the same time lasted forever.

Those moments are still occurring now

In my mind

As you read these words;

Every day he dies again,

Every day I grieve,

Every day he dies again,

Never more will I be free.

Anonymous

This piece is reflective of the words written and shared by many young people found in detention. They often spoke of witnessing death or the losses of friends to gang violence. Not only was death a reoccurring theme, but such topics brought intense emotions. The kids often seemed stuck in that moment or in the memory of the death, reliving it over and over, memorializing their friend or "homie". Experiencing events such as these often seemed to intensify feelings of hopeless and a reckless abandon of the future, expecting and anticipating a similar fate for themselves.

I will never forget an experience I had with a young man in 2003. While in detention after just being committed to time in ADOBE, he found out that his older brother had just been shot and killed. What added to his pain was that he was not to be allowed to attend his brother's funeral for a variety of reasons. His shock, anger and anguish were heart wrenching. I couldn't help but sob, right along with him while, at the same time, trying to give him comfort and hope.

A Sound Silence describes another common phenomenon in the juvenile detention setting, that of jarring dreams, nightmares and night terrors. It was common for young people to share experiences of intense dreams and flashbacks, explaining why they had gotten little sleep the night before or what was really bothering them or why they didn't want to go to sleep or why they were on suicide watch. They often expressed how these reoccurring images left them with feelings of dread, fear and great sadness.

Due to the nature or content of these creative writings, staff often expressed rebuttals or wariness of The Beat Within. The kids wrote out of their own experiences...and yes! those experiences were often dark and full of pain and trauma.

As someone who has been journaling for years, myself, I understood the importance of these creative writing experiences. Not only were these young people being given an opportunity to talk and share their opinions on a variety of topics and to develop their writing skills, but writing and journaling provided them with a therapeutic outlet.

Writing about one's pain is like the release valve on a pressure cooker, and can ease the tension, anger, or hopelessness, just enough, to allow one to continue on for another day or another moment, without acting out in a destructive manner towards self or others.

My personal and professional opinion is that the presence of a creative, therapeutic writing program, such as The Beat Within, is a necessary positive outlet for pain, anger, frustration and a host of intense emotions, experiences, and thought patterns. In my experience and observations over the 12+ years of working with kids in detention, journaling and creative writing increases safety and security on a unit by providing a value for pent up anger, pain, boredom, frustration, and despair. Declaring this witness again in verses from Hope Found...

Recognizing this truth

and then witnessing year in and year out

the proof

in the power of the written and spoken word

to give opportunity for expression of soul.

Even when to live

is unbearable and confusing,

it’s a relief to know you’re not alone

in your experience and the emotional truth you own.

...At what a mind can become

when the pain is released and one,

bent on restoration and redemption,

finds life not death

Hopefully it will spread

this vision of releasing voices in the west

across the nation,

Stand not in the way of this tide lest

the overwhelmed dam of hate and strife

break and down us all

finding our voices may we stand or silent we may fall

Don’t stop writing beaten hearts,

write what you can, say what you need to say

Write as if your very lives depended upon it

Tkaeu