in my wild adventure during college

in my wild adventures during college i smoked
weed a lot one year 
never got searched
never went to jail
never got a misdemeanor
never even paid a fine
yeah, Christian young woman, saved and sanctified me, smoking out
and getting high
living next to the weed man was pretty convenient
he guided me in rollin' my first blunt
she coached me in taking my first hit
dam near passing out on the floor 
yeah, Christian young woman, saved and sanctified me, packin that swisha tight
like spaghetti on a fork
together we got high
seeing you in juvi today
brought all the memories back
i'm embarrassed to compare
my story to yours 
never got searched
never went to jail
never got a misdemeanor
never even paid a fine
in my wild adventures during college
i went to new york
made it my mission to get some weed one night
i was thrilled by the allure
by the waft of danger on concrete street
new york weed laws back then
were much more severe than los angeles ones
the adventure became all the more appealing
i was with T and X, my black and brown brothers
we finally settled on buying from a random
brother on some random corner of NYC streets
to commemorate T and X bought fortys
as T and X drank they forty's and we walked through
a park
New York Police descended from the trees
shown flash lights on our brown faces
T and X were searched and given fines for
open cans of beer
i never prayed more
and my knees shaked
as police ignored me
useless bait 
my recently purchased sak lay in the bottom of my purse
dead silent shhhhhhhhhhh
Lord Jesus help
yeah conveniently calling on the Savior
press on press off relationship 
never got searched
never went to jail
never got a misdemeanor
never even paid a fine
from the outside
we ain't the same
i am college educated
high school graduated
two-parent household raised
mentored as a youth
church born and bred
but, you see,
i like you have made
my choices
you me, we
we have made choices
i smoked weed because i was depressed
choice,
i smoked weed because i felt like dying
choice
i smoked weed because i thought nobody cared
lie
i smoked weed because i felt alone
lie
i smoked weed because i was mourning a broken relationship
between Christ and I
truth
in my wild adventures during college i smoked weed a lot one year
never got searched
never went to jail
never got a misdemeanor
never even paid a fine
the truth is if i was a black or brown man
i would probably be telling you a different story
if i had the appearance of what may be a scary threat
i would probably be telling you a different story
if you're in juvi because of weed
you were not so fortunate as me
but this i know
you aren't no different than me
after all
because you and me
need to be ten thousand times more
doses of Jesus
to cure all the ills and fills
within us
to be WHOLE

staying reflective in the crisis

i notice a pattern on this blog. the pattern is a write a lot of my angst out of writing. i'm glad their is a record of my shadow side with writing, because my journey is not all flying unicorns and chocolate buttercups. something happened to me at work yesterday that uncovered another one of my shadows. shadow is another way to say learning edge, growth edge, quirk or, let's break it down, straight up weakness. a crisis happened at work, and i failed to share with my co-worker what i truly felt about the situation. instead, i let her worry become my worry and cloud my feelings. i became reactionary instead of reflective. as i reflect on the incident, i can name my feelings and the despair i felt in the moment. i felt alone and unsupported by my co-worker throughout the shift and i was not able to express this to her. instead, i kept silent. my survival tendencies have shaped me to be "keep calm" during times of high tension. this happened in my family when emotions were out of control and ready to punch-someone-in-the-face. in those instances of family violence, i remained silent. unable to name my feelings because i am embedded in the despair of the moment. so i swallow my words, and ignore my heart. numbed by the moment i freeze my feelings. only to resume later, and discover the soil where the emotional seeds fell. i am at a loss of what to do, do i go back and remind the co-worker of the situation. do ignore what happened and be better next time? i don't know.

creative tension

i feel stuck between the tension of creating and laziness. i don't think this is uncommon for many artist. but i've gotten quite the case lately. i've ignored my desire to write, to fotograph, to create. i asked my friend to help me write a movie script and he said, "i'm not feeling creative right now" i felt sad. he named a reality for himself that i did not want to name for myself. i have aspirations but my follow through is incredibly inconsistent.

i consider teaching to be an art. but setting aside time to work on my art regularly is radically different than teaching my young people how to take pictures or how to write. i also need to be embedded in my own practice. today, i dwell on reflecting not only what i can do, but how i can do it. my coach and i have been working on creating a plan for the future. she's suggested i create a step by step plan. i will. ahora. now. time. do. did. ciao.

volare

volar sin lunadas
le canta a la luna
que tiene en especial la luna?
le banaron el cuerpo
mas la luna no pudo sostener el poder
del Salvador
y por eso la luz se murio.
el dia que se murio la luz
nadie le canto
el dia que el resusito
el cielo quedo mudo
con un nuevo respeto

13 year anniversary

it was 13 years ago when i became rebellious. i experienced a true teenage rebellion and weed was not my drug of choice. writing was. i was so ashamed of my addiction, i hid it from so many. not feeling worthy to call myself a writer, because i was not affirmed with an A. so i secretly kept at my craft only practicing when english papers were due. or when i attended and wrote in the occasional poetry class. i did not, however, stop fantasizing of my dream of becoming a writer or a poet. especially when i attended the youth poetry slams that san francisco made trendy. i have since become a writer. i am still far from good. even farther from great. two moons removed from prolific. i'm okay with that. i am closer to being ready to die trying. i have started by teaching. someone once told me try doing something else, and if you can't live without it, you'll return to it. it, for me, has been writing. i've tried to be someone else, do something else. and when i read "bad writing" mine especially, i get pissed. and i want to be better. i just got feedback from a teacher, "you have to be clear and precise" "people out there get pissed when you waste their time" with "bad writing" said she. well, once i got passed the shell shock of truthness, i allowed reality to do its work. i let the words sink in and grip my ego. i thrusted myself into the messiness of this work and the long road ahead. thank God for my insistence. for the gift of my insistence. until i see the books that lie within on that self. i will die trying. and so there i went to the house of writing. and there a met on paper many writers, authors of more than 30 books what?? and i saw the cost of a class $200 dollars for six weeks. and i began to think of a master plan.

jazz scholar

is there really order in the chaos?
do humans only say so to be right?
is our need to make meaning that embedded?
is it necessary to identify the order?
just be
be
free form
form
be
free
my feet can keep up with the messiness
my hips follow its syncopation
my head rests in the dizziness
i don't have a tv
but i do
have
jazz

the re-surface

there has been a shift in these last four months. a problem that has evidently stopped the flow of  words: i am happy. there is a second factor, without asking for it, i received the gift of healing from depression. i have not been depressed in three months. apparently my writing is not use to this inner joy because i've been dreaming in poetry. and when it comes time to commit my words to paper, silence surfaces, giving me little with which to work. so here i am a happy 25 year old woman with a lingering hardness that is blocking my words. that won't let my heart be released. the absence of words and tight-locked air keep my spirit tangled like mushy seaweed and a dead jellyfish. so i've got to swim to release my spirit. write so that my words won't only be sad. won't only be light in my darkness. in the birth of new light, and revealing truths, unravel from the trumpet like dizzy g. to confuse. to make sense. to make meaning.