by Joe B.

Today while at I get an enthused request from one of my bosses to walk up Van Ness bus bench to see an Anti Drug Ad.

Listening with part of my mind as street noise drones outside.

After a few chores up Van Ness go I looking for the bus ad, you know the ones.

Like the TV commercial Parent’s The Anti-Drug campaign similar to.

1) Older brother or father’s watching over younger sibling and son.
2) Young brother going downstairs talking about how marijuana turned his older sibling couch potato pot smoking bum.

3) A fast food smoked filled car at a fast food running into child on a bike.
4) A Bunch of friends doing nothing with lives but lighting up.

5) Then there’s the tragic accident of accidental fratricide by an older sibling driving a car under marijuana’s influence,planting flowers at the site along of the road where his brother’s life ended because of him.

Seen ads, very powerful incentive to slow or stop altogether drug use.

Now that I’ve regurgitated said ads I voice my views walking up the street this fine sunny day.

Black mothers are: The Enforcer’s in their constant ongoing demands that their children be/stay in school and are supervising their child’s safety near or far from home.

White mother’s are: The Inquisitor’s constantly asking where,when, their children are,spying on them looking for drug paraphernalia without asking permission because they are out to save them from ruining their lives and parents rarely ask permission to save their own children’s lives.

My boss also talk of the possible influence of Psychologist and Scholar Dr. Wade Nobles who’s deconstructs of Western Psychology of Individuation and
African Communal Village raising of children.

(Reminds me of the neighborhood grapevine, where if I or other kids did something wrong the elders be they strangers, relatives,or unrelated friends would inform parents and relatives of what transpired and backsides would be warmed and lips may get fat and bloody for back talk to authority figures… Any authority figure.

The Van Ness Bus Ad is the one with the black female as a tough determined mother.

It’s the Parents Are The Anti-Drug to the Drug Problem in America.

Parents monitoring their children to prevent them from turning on-tuning-out-losing brain cells.

I say its confluence and that it all kinds of dovetails into each other and sooner or later Dr. W. Noble’s, old school parenting Beat child to inch of their lives so they’ll use their brains and bodies for more than glue sniffing, drinking, pill popping, and drugs.

I’m wondering if young adults between the ages of 18-21 safe sexing along with adults all consenting without HIV/ AID’s dangers would make everyone feel less in danger?

Sex and drugs is Russian Roulette with egg and sperm.
While safe sex with all precautions is clean but can easily be seen a dirtier because men and especially women no longer must pay the ultimate price for their lustful ways.

That reminds me to visit Good Vibrations and invest in a few Women’s condoms if sacred sex and equality reigns then my fem friends should ware condoms too so I can if not feel them I can at least feel the sensation of pseudo freedom even now that she’s has on rubbers two.

To me its an ad and if it works to make a person think twice about taking drugs then its been worth it, if not it was another brilliant campaigned that tanked.

Ads aside its up to every individual brain pan to decide not to go this trip and others to help friends, family, lover’s, and others to think before tripping.

People have experimented with drugs for a long time why not sneak intelli-drugs making people smarter since you have a population already self medicating create a brain cell making, repairing, synthetic that is harmless that does the complete opposite when taking more.

Could it be as people become wiser with permanently increased intelligence they’d stop on their own or keep on until their brains explode?

I’ve no answers but it seems using drugs to beat drugs might be a whacked answer but being a hard ass, prosecution and jail time didn’t work maybe radical out-of-box- thinking is what’s needed or we’ll all be dealing with the drug problem for a long time to come.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joseph Bolden

The Worse That Can Happen

You know how one wears an article of clothing, like shoes, favorite shirt or hat how after a while even when its not worn still feels like its on?

I have a backpack its my Grandmother’s last gift along with Gensing Tea when she visited France. My usual way is wake, pray, shower, shave or not, brush teeth, gargle, use deodorant then pick up backpack heading out of my place. I did everything as usual or so I thought.

Got on the 19 bus at the corner 7th street,on the bus and ride. It’s then I feel odd then realize no backpack!

I was so use to its feel on my shoulder and back that I may have left it at the bus stop, you don’t leave anything for a second on Market Street it could be sold, broken into, or destroyed on the spot.

Frantic I got off the bus fast walking down the block as fast as possible but when I get to the transit stop not a sign of my familiar beat up brown leather backpack.

I feel drained, how could I leave my grandmother’s gift to me out there to be taken? Inside was a day planner, a short story call Abomination, pens and condoms when leaving the city.

I go home feeling like a fool, unlock the door and inside on the floor safe and sound is the backpack almost saying "What’s up, forgot about me?"

Then it occurred to me what’s the worst that could happen it had happened for real? Nothing but regret and buying a new backpack, planner, my short story is on disk
at home if the hardcopies were tossed about.

I catch another bus thinking of another worst that Can happen reality. What I Never Find The Love Of My Life?
What’s The Worst That Can Happen To Me?
First I must leave a long term relationship with a woman I don’t love though respect but marriage was out an we both knew it.

I now know the meaning stud that’s what I’ve been to her when she’s not in other relationships she could always rely on me when called. We fit each other hand and glove the sex is always long because I want her pleased and so I’ve learned or natural aging has given me that gift.

But I must leave her or I’ll always be a substitute love, stand in, her personal living vibrator. I’ve done that for another woman but it was one time and there was no being caught or awkward moments.

This dear one that has shown me affection that I have been with for many years has not purposely done this but I know I’m her booty call and stud and I have to stop it.
When going to her its always "Take of them damn clothes" but said in a playful way.

And if I end us literally studding women young and old, floating around and not getting married because I’m seen as a pleasure machine instead of husband, father, material maybe that will have to be all men aren’t marriage material I just hope I find the one women who not only I can please in bed but also sees me as fully human.

I’m on sex sites now stopped short of cyber sex because the only cyber sex I’ll do is with woman or women as the camera’s roll.

Learning about chat rooms, email messaging is so new and I’m suppose to be in a media non profit organization!

I don't know whether some blessed woman won’t only chose me for bedding but also a marriage bed I’ll be praying to whatever deity Woman or Male that has delivered me into the arms of a mate.

But if life makes me only a very good stunt"D" in demand, a one man stud service for various women young or more mature then I’ll be that hiding whatever silent tears because guys are suppose love being called a stud and brag on it.

But for me it would mean my ultimate failure as a man to find a mate, marry, be a lovin husband, disciplined father.

The last time I heard STUD besides race horses it was about black men in slavery studding for master/mistress creating children to be sold to other plantations.

Its taken time to live what has happened to our women and men it still affects us for when I realized what I had become, was doing it hurts deep to be considered nothing more that a "F- machine made of flesh.

I look at myself and I cannot believe I've rejected the tag name but I just don’t want be a 1 or 2 dimensional being.

So that’s it and comments, questions, statements, stories to

tell(new title) just telljoe. Or

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Staff Writer

On Sunday, November 16th @2:00 pm very low income youth and adult publishers will read from their exciting new books and CD’s…Each publication is borne from these authors’ experiences with poverty, racism, survival and resistance.

The world of publishing is a very difficult world for poor people to penetrate. Through the Digital Resistance Program at POOR Magazine, these writers and artists have gained the skills to layout and compose their own publications. When the youth and adult artists graduate from the Program their work is published by POOR Press- a new publishing project of POOR Magazine

Some of the publications are:

∑ Spittin Flames –CD and book-let- Original Spoken Word, Rap and Art by Brandon Jones
Brandon is a 16 year old African-American poet and rap artist using the WORD to come up and out of poverty and in turn give his scholarship back to the community. He is a graduate of POOR Magazine’s Digital Resistance Program where he designed, edited, recorded all his own work and then published his first CD with POOR Press

∑ Oji Volume I – Words, Art and Music by Oji Elliot – Book and CD
Oji Elliot is a young African-American visual artist, poet and musician who paints pictures of words and creates words out of pictures. Oji designed this first book of his art in POOR’s Digital Resistance Program and published it with POOR Press.

∑ Wasted Waters –by POOR Press © 2003- A first person account of a woman’s struggle to be heard on racism and injustice in the workplace.
by Carmi Johnson
Carmi Johnsons is a graduate of POOR’s digital Resistance Program. She tells a compelling story of a whistle-blower who faced intimidation and racist scare tactics when she tried to tell the truth about what was happening at her job.

There will also be new works by The Po Poet Laureate, Byron Gafford and The Po Poets of POOR Magazine. The event will be held at the Latino Hispanic Room of the San Francisco Public Library – there will be a free lunch provided.

This is also a BENEFIT for a VERY poor POOR Magazine.
$3-10 donation requested at the door

POOR Press is a media access project of POOR Magazine. Our goals at POOR Press are to publish the words images and scholarship of very low and no-income youth and adults, and in so doing infuse the world of publishing with these new works of poverty scholarship

San Francisco Public Library
Latino/Hispanic Community Room
100 Larkin Street, SF CA 94102
Located on the Library’s lower level
Enter 30 Grove Street, proceed downstairs

All meetings in the library are free and open to the public
Call (415)557-4400

by Joseph Bolden

Conflicts, some a eternally compelling as in Saving your mother or wife in a sea encircled by sharks.

As Jane/John Law after a killer or assassins one your brother or sister the other your dearest friend who took a bullet or lost a limbs saving you from mortar rounds or hidden booby trapped mind.

Extremely difficult what to do between love, honor, an the reality of the job at hand people do make them cognizant of their actions, living with it inside their heads.

Mine is about the health of my teeth. Recently going to U. C.S.F.'s [University Of California, San Francisco]
later Periodontology [gum’s holding teeth together]

I’ve missed one appointment so far. Doing the pay-as-you-go rout solidifies my reputation as a poor non insured person on a low pay job that makes those pays soon as possible.

My conflict came last week for every once in a while the job assigns me to take pictures or do a story last week its only pictures in Oakland’s City Hall where a town hall meeting is to take place.

On Saturday, September 13, 2003 from 7 am to 12 noon or later is to be an all day event on the seriousness of youth being killed by either other youths or the police.

There is no conflict and besides doing this gets me a Monday half day to further my personal dental health.

The location: At 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza, City Council Chambers. It starts from 7 to 10 am KPOO 89.5 live broadcast begins. Bulldog Coffee Shop donated coffee and pastries.

The place on 1739 Broadway near bart served excellent deserts which kept me up and awake when I arrived by 9:45 as the panel were full sessions speaking a small audience of Oakland’s concerned citizen’s.

Suspiciously absent is mainstream much media except for
KPFA 94.1, KTOP-TV Channel10(recording for tv)

An ethnic, financially diverse community, Oakland, California, with approximately 400,000. Over 30% of the households in Oakland live on less that $25,000 per year and unemployment rates is over 10%. This some of the facts from Vice-Mayor Nancy Nadel’s Violence Prevention Working Group Fact Sheet.

My notes are sketchy as best. Diverse organizations converged in the hall The first few hours before I am there is discussion about Mr. Ward Connelly and Proposition 54
he endorses.

It makes counting minority (non white) groups saying America’s has achieved its color blind goal when in reality all Prop. 54 has the potential of returning to days gone by of not being included, counted, and less monies for inner city neighborhoods.

Davy D said "He wants to put the sheets back on."
Organizations and individuals endorsing Prop. 54 are David Horowitz, Log Cabin Republican’s, George Will, and Ward Williams. From what I hear about Mr. Ward Connelly is he’s mouth piece, front man for this legislation earning his $700,000 or more yearly some.

This backward, reversal or legal rights gained literally by the blood of millions by known and anonymous people
should not be disgraced by this so called forward approach to discrimination.

We as black, brown, (pick rainbow) folks remain singled out for "lawful-under-suspicion or suspicious character(s).

Break-ins by police on black-while-home, on the street, to driving-while-brown or black it has become a normalized pathological systematic stigma that all young black males and women are targets to be stopped, harassed, molested, and in worst cases murdered-by-accident and now a initiative stealthily about to voted on with nearly no fanfare harking back to days when us colored folks supposedly knew or places.

Those days are long gone never to return no matter how much a few behind-the-times organizations and people wish to turn the clock back.

Our youth’s, assaulted, molested, dying at so alarming a rate that the word "Genocide" comes to mind.
Mr. Joshua Hanes, Ms. Angela Davenport of (Lovelife Foundation) spoke of their fears as youth going to friend’s funerals, hearing gunshots in their neighborhoods.

Mrs. Lorain Taylor, angrily explains the loss of her twin son’s on February, 8, 2000.

One man on the panel said aloud "92 homicides.
1) Police are real dumb, 2) The Killer’s are real smart.

The Hearings of 1979 and C.I.A’s dumping of guns, drugs in inner city neighborhoods to weaken, cause dissention, breaking up stable families as a systematic destruction of political units to.

I could be paranoid but here is what Insane logic that comes to my mind.

Destroy families by tracking (black, brown-rainbow)
children in schools, jail children at younger ages, kill ‘em (smartest ones) young before they reproduce, try as adults or have ‘em kill each other in drive-by’s drug wars.

Reducing educated population.

Tried as adults for longer jail time and upon return to communities they cannot vote for life. Once the cycle begins running "The Powers That Be tweak it so often so the cycle continues until people within the cycle able to see beyond and brake from it individually and as organized groups to continuously brake and reverse the cycle.

The Chicken’s Have Come Home To Roost Again.

It may be a racist thought but here goes: if the exact same problems were in white communities and their children were being shot and killed, jailed for lengths of times, and more children and young men in jails than in college and making the military the one option for educational opportunities I dare say the hue and cry would be felt all over the country!

Like in the so called war on drugs when its in the rainbow communities its normal but in white suburbia it becomes a panic as parent’s demand treatment on demand doing anything to save their loved ones or abandoning them to their fates.

Guess what? Suburbia is going through it now, soon their son’s, daughter’s will be in jails at younger and younger ages if not now. Looks like The Chicken’s Have Come Home To Roost Again.

Like I said sketchy notes, I didn’t get too many people’s names, or organizations but hope readers have got most of what I was writing.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Martrice Candler/PoorNewsNetwork Youth in the Media Intern

We cannot walk alone

And as we walk

We must make the pledge

That we must walk ahead

We cannot turn back

- Martin Luther King

I would like to begin this article by acknowledging that only a short time ago, 38 years to be exact, Blacks in the south were violated to the point that laws had to be enacted to protect the basic right to vote. In fact, many of us were killed by lynching or injured during our attempt to secure the right to vote.

In the 2000 Presidential election, watching the candidates run for office made me queasy. I always felt that the persona the candidates portrayed in their advertisements were artificial and that the media focus was limited and slanted. I, as a young Black woman, felt excluded from the future president’s agenda and knew institutional racism disqualified most honest women, men and people of color for running for office. That fact alone created my feeling of disconnect from the government and I lost interest in voting. As a young woman of color I felt like I was receiving a subliminal message to not vote at all. In fact, the 2000 presidential election revealed that there is still injustice within our voting system: The same tactics used in the Jim Crow days of the south are still in practice today. Strategies from Jim Crow laws from 1877 to the mid 1960’s were recreated in Florida in the last presidential election when Republican agents and local police warned Blacks seeking to vote that innocent technical errors in their registration information such as wrong addresses could subject them to arrest. Blacks seeking to vote were photographed, with the suggestion that they might be arrested later.
In 1965, the Voting Rights Act was instituted to protect Blacks seeking the right to vote. It makes me sad for all those who participated in the civil rights movement who suffered and died that almost forty years later, Florida demonstrated that injustice is still alive.

In high school one of my teachers encouraged me to work the voting booths for an opportunity to earn a little extra money and learn about voting so when it was my turn to vote I would have learned the process. I signed up to work the voting booths and at first it felt good. After my training, I started reading voting manuals. The material was hard to read. I had learned how to work the voting booths but I didn’t know how to pick what president to vote for. That made me I feel out of place, undereducated, like I didn’t belong. It was the closest I had ever come to voting and using the voting booths.

I can understand why voting isn’t popular in the Black community. Some of us were raised by parents or grandparents who have experienced and witnessed injustices that are still among us. My Grandmother, who raised me, is an 80 year old Texas native. I have been influenced by the stories she told me about enduring racism. "I think my vote should count, but you don’t miss something you never had," was my grandmother’s reply when I asked her about voting.

To educate myself on this issue I interviewed a Black community Advocate, MaJeid Crawford, owner of theater company "Roots and Rhythm Playhouse," an after school program for youth and co owner of all night studio located in Hunters Point, who works to get young people of color to vote. When I asked Majeid how to get black youth to vote he said, "We need to get black youth together and glorify empowerment. I feel that Black people never had the opportunity for voting to be ingrained in our culture, and it makes it hard to internalize voting when we have adopted and glorified self destructive lifestyles, which leads to catching felonies which strip us of our right to vote. We need to make voting cool. The problem with voting is that it is such an individual task."

PNN: How old were you the first time you voted?
M: I was 18 when I first voted. I voted one year after that but I didn’t vote again until I was 26. I didn’t vote regularly but I will not make that mistake anymore.

PNN: Do you feel that you were given enough information through formal education to know how to access the democratic Process?
M.Definitely not! In high school, the teachers talked about voting as it related to white people with big wigs, the founding of the 13 colonies. I remember teachers talking about the Civil Rights era and how we got the right to vote, but they hardly talked about what Black people had to do to get it. I don’t remember any of my classes at Francisco Middle School, Galileo, Mc Ateer or Downtown High that talked about the local elections which applied to me as a youth growing up in San Francisco, a city with some of the worst racial and social disparities in United States.

PNN: Do you feel black youth receive enough education to know where to seek information to make informed democratic decisions?
M:No. The city government, social service industry and schools do not package information to let Black youth or any youth know which initiatives and politicians represent their best interests. Non-profit organizations are limited to what they can legally do, but I don’t remember many pastors in church talking about the importance of voting. As an adult I hardly know where to go to seek information about elections; and what is available is usually written in a confusing manner.

PNN:For Example: Do you think black youth know how to obtain accurate information on the candidates and their political history and position?
M: No. When you search the Internet it is like a maze. When you find the information you are looking for it’s written in a way that is hard for many adults to understand, let alone youth.

PNN:Have you or anyone you know been harassed by the police? If so did the experience affect the way you view or viewed the government and voting?
M: Yes. I was waiting on the bus when a police car rolled by and one of the officers stuck his middle finger at my friend. My friend threw a napkin on the ground. The police made a U-turn, got out of the car and told my friend to take off his shoes and socks, then started stomping his feet. One of the cops looked at me and told me, "get the fuck out of here!" I called 911, told dispatch some men were harassing my friend. Dispatch asked me what they looked like. I said they were police officers her reply was that she couldn’t do anything about it. She said since the police were already there, why should she send more? I told her that the police are the ones that are harassing my friend and she hung up on me.

PNN: Do you think that the way police harass black youth negatively affects the way black youth feel about the government and voting?
M:Yes! It is wise for Black youth to not trust our government which legally claimed we were 3/4 human.
As a youth I felt like I was the enemy of the police and the government. It seemed like whatever I did to try and better myself and my community, the government would undue it. It made me afraid of the police and I found myself wanting to accept my situation as a black man and stop resisting. Voting seemed like a small solution to the big problems I faced as a black youth. What made it worse was that in my own community I was catching hell from people that looked like me and the police who were supposed to protect and serve were against me.

PNN: Do you feel that school should prepare students to exercise their full rights as citizens?
M: Yes. Next to home, schools are the most important place in the community. Where else do kids sit for six hours Monday through Friday? Schools should teach students how to vote and provide straight forward and easy to understand information about the impact each initiative will have on the communities of black youth and all youth. Each school should look at its population and teach them how to vote in a way that will empower themselves and their communities. They should give information to bring home to their parents. Education is most useful when it teaches a person how to survive. The reality, though, is schools will never empower us. The same government that put us in this position is the same government that pays for the schools. The public school system in San Francisco has been mis-educating children and children of color for over 30 years. If you go to the school district they will tell you themselves. The one thing that public schools do well is create jobs for white people.

PNN: In essence you’re saying that the institutions in our country such as education and paramilitary create a mistrust of government as a whole. If so, how do we correct it by voting within a system that we see as corrupt, misrepresenting us and or not representing us at all?
M: I realize Black people ( and all people) in this country are damaged by racism, mis-education and hate. The only way to cure ourselves is with knowledge of self. We need to get grimy! Protest the injustice and demand what we need, have rallies in the black communities with support from positive black role models. Bring music, food, registration papers and pens, promote voting and make voting the next biggest trend to the Air Force One’s. We need to transform our hoods and ghettos into black communities. We need to have representation, hold meetings, and make web sites for youth and adults informing them about all local initiatives that are coming up and how it relates to them, in simple English. We have to educate, motivate and organize ourselves. We must take control of these schools that our tax dollars pay for, bring in teachers from our own community and create a new curriculum all together that will give Black children knowledge of themselves, without that we will continue to be mis-educated, tricked by politicians and misleading initiatives, have high infant mortality rates, populate the prisons, be on welfare and reinforce the many stereotypes black people are under.

In my search for hope and direction on this issue I decided to seek out elders in my community, I was priveledged to speak with Minnijean Brown of The Little rock nine. Ms. Brown left me with these strong words, "The denial of the truth of our history is such that we won’t feel any kinship with our history which is a social control mechanism. Black youth need to know that their not in charge of their own lives, but the transnational and multinationals are in control of their lives. A many-pronged problem requires a many- pronged response. One of the things that happened in the Civil Rights movement was forming Freedom Schools. If you look at the conditions in Mississippi they’re comparable to some conditions in various communities here. All is not lost," she proclaimed, " it just requires some creativity. Voting is a apart of that creative response.."

For more work by PNN youth in the media go on-line to www.poormagazine.org and click on Youth in Media. To hear more of Matrice Candler's media activism, poetry and art come to POOR's Book Release Party at 2:00 pm on Sunday November 16th at The SF Main Branch Library at Grove and Larkin streets. For more info call 415-863-6306

Untitled

By Alpha Woody III

For real man


The streets is Calling

Come holla at me man

The streets wont talk no for an answer

The streets aren’t satisfied

Till it sucks all the life out cha man

The streets got crack, hop and speed man

The streets move in high speeds

The streets are stained with blood from my brothers and sisters

Look right here man

The streets ain’t playing man

Listen to the fading sounds


Of the black men and women marching and chanting for unity and equal rights man

Come over here with me
Look this way

Listen man

Gun shots

Screams

Babies crying in dumpsters

Over here man

Smell

Don’t choke

It’s crack smoke man

Feel my hand it shivers in the cold man

Watch out duck

From the long arm of the law man

Dressed in a three piece suit man

Talking real fast

Looking down on you man

Am I human man?

Damn man

I’m stuck

Help me man

by Joe B.

Its been a long week but everything’s fine.

President Al Gore’s former Senator Joseph Liberman is VP,a student writes a best selling autobiography while still in college but being so young must revise it again in 15 to 20 years.

My plane trip to Cuba, Egypt, Iraq, Iran, and Palestine is a quiet business vacation where interviews with Mary Cary, Angelyne Cali's new Governor and Lieutenant Governor respectively.

Senator Larry Flint, has just signed into law lowering the voting age to 14 to 16 years.

Racism, sexism, Xenophobia,all the other negative ism’s are dead and gone by 2010.

Mars and the moon now populated, the aging process has been reversed, slowed, and stopped by combing nanotechnology, cybernetics and genetic engineering.

Anyone can be beautiful because of deep re-engin eered tissue/bone regeneration technologies; odd looking(ugly)people now seen as more real are the new faces to on tv and movies.

All the above is real. IN AN ALTERNATE UNIVERSE!

To bad Mr. Ward Connelly dosen't live there but here on this tired sexist, homophobic, racist, and ism scarred world.

Maybe he visited the place and for a time before being yanked back into this one.

Problem is this world is the one with bad attitudes, people who’d rather discriminate than help solve these problems.

Proposition 54 blinds all kinds of organizations, employment, medical,you name it and 54 for will make those still suffering racism, sexism, homophobic to religious zealots continue by saying "everything is fine,we don’t need to know about race for scientific studies because were all the same.

I’m still trying to figure out how Asian or Pacific Islander women increased their bust size.

Is it foods eaten in America, sexual relations producing this outward physicallity, or artificial enhancements?

I don’t know wich but banning information even as frivolous as this is one thing but for health and genetic markers for race, sex, natural origins are still needed.

We cannot go back to being hidden, ignored, having our rights trampled until a pol is up for re election.

America for non whites has always been a non discriminating, equal opportunity killing field, it still is.

As long as rainbow folks die from birth, homicide, or police "assisted accidents" jails, we should also be counted in job creation, education,and all that we do both positive and negative.

A last thought. Infant Deaths Black babies die at more than twice the rate of all babies in San Francisco.
[What Did I Say About The Killing Fields?]

I Forgot to say, It Starts Early… Source S.F.P.H. Vital Records 2000.

Its Learn how to stop Black Babies From Dying #Phone number is one of 1-800-300-9550. many Organizations.
The Seven Principles Project For African American Infant Survival And Community–Unity.

This I read on a 19th Polk street bus on my way to work in.

That’s one of many reasons to stop this "Hear no evil,See no evil,Speak,Think no evil.

We’ll all be treated with the respect due us."

Yeah right, and all young girls and women are sweet, kind, desperate for male companionship.

Tell us all another fairy tale Mr. Connelly, we might believe them too.

Mr. Connelly is either living in an isolated bubble or his mind is in one?

But if Ward Connelly’s mind bubble becomes real it could be a return to Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man.

An early 1950’s(’53) novel of a Black man’s harrowing, psychological journey in America.

Let’s not return to those days when most rainbow folks were literally invisible in the eyes of White America.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

Being told Tuesday about Saturday’s International Women’s Day March and being there are two different things.

Didn’t want get up early, shower, be dressed, or call waking someone else up either but a job’s a job.

At a friends house the p/c has "Global Woman’s Strike – Invest In Caring Not Killing.

The 21st century equivalent of the 1960’s "Make Love Not War" cry.

As Poor Magazine employee my job is to cover it.

On a radio "Ghetto Child" Shaggy and Go or Gio?

A poignant uplifting song about ghetto’s striving for better lives inspite of trouble and stereotypes about them from outside forces wanting to, stay consumers and fail in life.

Another by ‘City High "What Would You Do" About a young mother working as stripper to provide for her child.

Just as gritty, down to earth as the other one.

I.T.W.D means to me is an extra day of work and no date at the end. Let me repeat.

After women speak, clap, sing, show banners explain why war is worse on women and children, then a march. NO DATE AT THE END.

Me and a friend quickly walk to market street taking a bus down to Market and Beale street where a few women gather with signs protesting Bechtel, ‘Prez Bush and other negative icons.

I heard about Crete, a thriving civilization 3600 years ago and it fall but during its time men, women, have equal status and now 3600 years later the spirit and reality of that time may be coming again.

I think she’s from the National Lawyer’s Guild their phone number is 285-1011) for more information.

Hope the numbers correct.

I also over hear a woman say "There are as many cops as there are women."

Looking behind them I do see lots of blues and a three squad cars parked.

The cops are lounging around talking, laughing being paid well for watching this dangerous contingent of women, men, and people gathered today.

Mike, another member of Poor Magazine supplied me with a portable camera to take clear sharp photo’s of both people and objects there; on was Bechtel’s building and it passenger or business car on wheels.

Dr. Helen Caldecott anti-nuclear activist familiar voice eloquently spoke out facts that all our lives are in crisis as this war countdown quickens.

Tiny, Mari V., and Dharma are there as ‘PO Poet’s using powerful spoken words adding their strength to women’s day as Mike and I look on snapping pictures.

After the ‘PO Poets finished I hand the camera to Tiny making my slow escape up Market Street.

I’ve been in enough marches to know it takes a long time with stops, starts, speeches, and street theater.

I just want to eat lunch at St. Anthony’s then write my report and head home where a warm bed awaits beside I’ve no money for dancing or 2 beer minimum.

All that was spent last night on two young women with bright futures ahead of them.

PS I’d love to learn Ballroom, Salsa, Merengua, dances.

Being a straight male with some Merengua lessons its difficult to find these places, plus money spent on liquor and couples – women free and me a single guy, well lets say Gay guys dance way better than I but then go home with boyfriends unless women do'em anyway.

So ladies tell me where lessons in Ballroom and Merengue are besides City College.

P L E A S E. Don’t want to lose what little rhythm I’ve got.

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PO Box #645

San Francisco, CA 94102

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Tiny/PoorNewsNetwork

“No justice No Peace”, voices tumbled out of the non-descript tenderloin office-voices belonging to houseless folks – poor people –economic justice advocates – low and no-wage workers…..

“No Justice No Peace” , dark corners of empty concrete filling with human struggle,
as a coalition seeking justice, members of The SF Day Laborers, The Coalition on Homelessness, POOR Magazine/PNN, and many more – marched from the POWER office to City Hall…on Tuesday September 16th . It had been months – months which tasted like years – time dripping by like a million leaking faucets time spent fighting very wealthy corporate interests with million dollar media campaigns. who used poor and houseless folks for political gains – Today was the day – the jig was up! The gloves were off – we would play their game no longer – by any means necessary – the people would be heard – Proposotion N – the Gavin Newsome lie to the voters of San Francisco which pretended to “solve the homeless” problem – but in fact did nothing but make the lives of poor people poorer by reducing their workfare wage from almost nothing ($345.00 per month) to really nothing ($59.00 per month)- “No!!” we shouted- today we would fight til we were heard –even if it meant shutting down the San Francisco board of supervisors meeting-with all we had left-our voices!

“We’re going to shut down City Hall until they listen to the truth” one of the Community Journalists at POOR/PNN said to me as we stood in the doorway of the POWER offices in the tenderloin (People Organized to Win Employment Rights) preparing for the battle.We, the poor folk who would be directly affected by this racist, classist legislation were, In the tradition of Martin Luther King and |Gandhi planning a peaceful act of civil disobedience if the board didn’t do the right thing and kill the legislation.

“I am a new mother of a little girl, I am participating in this civil disobedience because I want to be proud that I am a San Francisco resident, I want her to be proud that she is a resident of San Francisco….”Anonymous freedom fighter

“ We are only asking for the Board to do the right thing – stop messing with the poor”
Willie X/POOR/PNN

“Proposition N separates the poor and gives them no choice to live…”
Lafeyette Ricks/POWER

“My name is Donna Gates, I have written every candidate for mayor in San Francisco- to give them ideas on how to solve homelessness in San Francisco – none of them have written me back….

“ We are here today to demand that the Board of Supervisors kill proposition N- San Francisco voters were fooled by the racist lies that Gavin Newsom told by spending millions of dollars… the board of Supervisors has to take a stand and do what’s right” Steve Williams,POWER

The day of resistance commenced in the board chambers. The people waited patiently as hours passed and then the political grandstanding by the board supervisors began- eventually the board voted to kill Proposition N- but in so doing they voted to table yet another form of prop N- ie Prop N lite a collaborative legislation between Supervisor Tony Hall and Gavin Newsom – at this point the people responded –our voices were heard - with an action of civil disobedience we created a “die-in” which effectively shut the meeting down for over 30 minutes.

“No Justice No Peace-We’re here because the blood is on your hands” while the people chanted we enacted the death of housless and poor people impacted by Prop N, Prop M and Prop N-lite in the board chambers…which would be and is the real result that would occur if any form of proposition N is passed

Outside the chambers of lies – justice hovered – protecting us – listening to us – after what seemed like a very long time, Board president Matt Gonzalez – agreed to meet with us and figure out what the next step would be – there were no arrests – the people were heard- and now the struggle continues….

by Joe B.

Whew, today is a difficult day for me.

Its pest control by the San Francisco Housing Authority.

The rules are at least once monthly our S.R.O’s[Single Room Occupancy]apartments to make sure fleas, silver fish, roaches or ants aren’t in or starting to invade the space.

The inspections and the annual visit to S.F.Housing Authority for rent check stubs three months consecutively.

The S.F.H.A. has rules, for me its always been panic time especially when I have to been on time.

Because Poor’s Magazine’s media job in the beginning my home was full of newspapers, generated online information, my own reports, recorded interviews.

My place would be a constant mess and I had little time straightening it up.

My problem is time control when visiting S.F. Housing Authority and cobbling three months worth of check stubs when I explained my dilemmas and that I will be late at times due my jobs erratic hours.

Luckily, I’m a quiet, mind-his-own-business tenant.

Over the years I have collected books, kept old painting, drawings, photographic and other artworks collecting dust.

A very dear friend helped me get rid of lots of excess junk.

Patient and kind but ruthless in throwing out anything not relevant which includes all the defunct

Penthouse Men’s graphic adult Comics and R rated video tapes.

Yes, the young woman was royally pissed off.

"Joe, your not keeping all this porn here are you?"

"But Mmm…"
"But ‘nothin Joe, its against women and it not erotica"
"Erotica is Soft core Porn with better press"
"You know porn is against women made by men"

"Oh, I’ll throw ‘em all out but I’ll collect them again"
[I haven’t finished reading Daddy’s Little Girl Part II].

After all the graphic smut is thrown down the apartment’s basement garbage area I went back to my room and saw my friend fast asleep she had rushed back to my place after seeing what a real paper, book, and junk storm it is.

We began cleaning up she almost gave up when I argue about books being donated to first and second floor library downstairs now she is in deep sleep.

The window is crack for some air circulates through the stuffy room.

I lock my door to let her catch up on whatever sleep she had missed helping me after that I resolved to keep my place clean so the next time she or any other woman visited it would not be as wild and dirty as it had been.

That was a few months ago before she left the states now on her return and the Housing Authority I must again do battle with my place this time its not as bad and easier
to clean up.

I hope when she again visits she’s not as tired but if she is she can take a long safe nap in my apartment as I go downstairs.

I know they’ll be no more panic days of cover-it-all-up.

I return to my apartment because if my friend wakes up alone in my darkened room she’ll be startled, scared, and slightly stressed and I won’t cause her to feel abandoned; she has helped me now I help her as friends are suppose to.

Funny how a single human being can change another.

I hope when she returns she feels as comfortable and even if she’s rested may still have a few z’s and feel safe in my place.

The books are gone and no overdue library books to think about.

Soon she’ll be back, I’m nervous about her seeing my place again but this time most of the porn is still gone except for Pent House Men’s Comic’s Daddy’s Little Girl Part II.

Maybe she won’t be as hard on me this time.

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1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by A. Faye Hicks, Po’ Poet Laureate/ POOR Magazine

The sign on the highway said “Welcome to San Rafael “
Anticipation danced through my veins, as the Golden Gate Transit Bus sped along.
The Comfortable velvet seats soothing my soul, I purr, such a class-act way to travel.
I compare this transportation to MUNI’s hard plastic seats built to cause pain.

My hot chocolate flavored skin is aglow, as I go on my mini-jaunt in Cali.
While tourists were jamming The City, The Wharf was packed, Golden Gate Park teeming, Animals overwhelmed at the zoo, People from around the world, bumping into each other to see the sights…. the money is flowing…., I needed some time out, some relief from my homeless existence in the City

By gosh, Me, the invisible homeless woman, stepped on, walked through if I don’t jump fast enough. I Decided to be a tourist for a Day, in famous Marin County! This is only my second Jaunt across the Golden Gate Bridge, although I have been residing in the Bay Area for over 40 years,…. Amazing! The opposite direction is my Normal route, To Oakland on the Bay Bridge, and of course the Bart.

My ebony eyes darken, the scenery was magnificent, quiet, peaceful, sublime.
And then I see the sign from the highway, “Welcome to San Rafael” small town U.S. A.
Mayberry R.F. D. a 3 “COP” town. No Crime or Grime in this manicured city.
I didn’t see any signs that read, ‘don’t be a litter bug’ or jay walking fined, or no open containers. No not even a gum wrapper was seen, as I covertly looked for a trashcan.
Yes, manicured streets, flowers galore, voices muted.

“Yipes” I whispered, a vehicle blasting Rap, sped across Main Street, America.
It momentarily stunned me at the noise, but peace resumed quickly.
A silent police cruiser drifted in the corner of my right eye, silently taking note that one of the Homeless has landed on their Sacred Turf. Talk about a welcoming committee!

I casually stroll down the Township streets, window shopping, probably the only person on the streets, 10 a.m. on a sultry August morning. I began to think I had entered the
Twi-Light Zone. Had I left California and entered Alabama, I need to be extra careful in this Neck of the Woods. How do the Police Cruiser move so quiet like. In the “City” all the lights be flashing, wheel squealing running into each other like “Key Stone Cops.
But in San Rafael, they are really the White Ghost, real spooky.

After looking in windows, reading menus, generally ignored, I paused for a break on a cold stone park-like bench, In the Civic Center. The heat was awesome.

The scenery was wonderful but I was bored shitless, and naturally there were no public, facilities. Removing my hot outer clothing, a city hat, I trek on back toward the bus terminal. I was on the look out for refreshments, liquid of course. I looked high and low but I couldn’t find a liquor store. And even though the sun was steaming, there were no water fountains, no little ladies room, and most importantly, no homeless people, yes, I realized, it was time to hit the road.

I lumbered back down the main street, remembering there was a store nearby. I saw numerous stores and restaurants, but with nothing to quench my thirst.
Suddenly I spot a familiar form from home, two white boys, The Haight/ Ashbury hippies, holes in jeans, scraggley hair and all. Even weed smoke drifting over their heads. I declined their offer., but asked where could I by a brew. Oh, what a relief it is Pop, pop, fizz, fizz. One block away right through the alley way, I trot on down, they drift on high.

Then I reach my destination, the “corner store” And then I see them. Guarding the “gate”, are two “peace” officers on either side of the door well. I saunter on pass.
I grab two brews, get in line with two customers. I notice as they leave that they have no problem going past the officers, but me and my brown paper bag are immediately accosted.

“Hello”, they proclaim loudly.

“Hi” I replied.

“Where you from”

“Out of town,” I replied, not naming the place.

“Well there will be no drinking on our public streets.”

I exploded! “I have no damn intentions of drinking on your streets, I am on my way out of this damn town right now,” I shocked myself shouting at this cop. Later I found he is named the gray wolf, by the homeless in San Rafael.

He screamed as I was one half a block away, “See that you are out of here…. before I…”

“What?”, I screamed back, turning the corner, but I was on my way , The Golden Gate Bus line was in my eyesight! Clutching my bag, climbing on the bus, I glanced back, I can feel the cops. Breathing down, behind my back, was a two wheel helmet gun toting police officer making sure I was on my way out of their town.

“Whoa”, I breathed easier to myself. What possessed me to holler at the cop, maybe it was the heat, or maybe I had entered the Twi-light Zone or maybe…. Jim Crow was still alive and well in San Rafael…..

For more of Ms. A. Fayes scholarship on racism click on the Po Poet Laureate button on PNN. To purchase a copy of her recent book; The POOR Nation click on the POOR Press button or call us at 415-863-6306

by Joe B.

I was half listening in 2002 last year when I hear "I want to bring new life into the world."

It slips my mind at the time as one loses track of things especially verbally.

One year I’m oblivious to a new life forming in my bosses womb.

By the time its noticed by me most of the female interns have the scoop while I’m still unaware.

There’s not much to say except there is scrambling for eating, drinking, and rest as my so active A.D.D. [Attention Deficit Disorder]employer and the father is and artist with A.D.D. too.

I’m thinking this isn’t good for loyal employee number 1. I’m to remind my boss and mother to be to eat meat, dairy products, ice cream, cheese omelets and other kinds of fattening foods so the alien (that’s what she calls the growing embryo growing inside her).
can gain weight and be a healthy child when finally born.

But its hard for someone used to practicing kick boxing, writing and performing play, creating poetry, plus running a non profit business helping to empower low to no income working poor people and families to drop everything, rest, and eat fattening foods for a new life within her.

It has to be a slow gradual process and being a man the best I could do is remind her "Its not about you, its about that new life in you but you do have to take care of yourself as best you can for both you and her/him.

Later I found out it will be a boy and boys need protein so do girls but it seems boys might need more.

Eventually she began to show looking like someone trying to shoplift a bowling ball from Target, K-Mart, or discount dollar stores.

On the one hand its on another I secretly worried knowing of another friend much younger nearly died from hospital staff infection.

When I saw her holding her child, the father standing by her it is a relief though seeing her tired and drained of blood from her face and arms well…

What joy for her is tempered with what almost happened.

Keeping my emotions under control that night I was able to walk a bit before taking a bus home letting the full rush of those emotions held in check.

Would Tiny have to go through this or will her child be an easier birth?

Both of these at different stages in their lives chose to give birth and for one it was almost a death sentence I pray it to easier in Tiny’s case.

There is yet another friend I’m worried about too but I sure she’ll make a great mother and take extreme care of herself besides whether with extra pounds or less she’s always a delectable.

The man who has her heart and soul is a blessed if he can also match her intellect, political awareness and sensitivity.

The Party was on Sunday, August, 10th. Ms. Ashley and Mrs. Non, Nun, None (I must ask her how to spell it) are with me in Ms. Ashley’s car headed to a warehouse in Oakland across the bay.

Its pack with friends of the family, people traveled from across country, across the bay and some I don’t from how far they traveled to be here?

Presents, food, a well trained dog, lovely women, guys with beer, and the guest or couple of honor.

There is a toast for an easy birth and that the child be a rabble rousing genius.

It was a great party I’m glad I went.

I’m deep in though while talking to Mrs. Non and the Ashley about the nearness of Mars and Venus trading places in months to come and how men, women, and people are getting into fights.

We see a full moon looming to left of us as drove back into San Francisco.

I rarely talk about politics, politicians, or political issues but Ashley and I conversed about how our old world is changing so fast and the few dinosaurs cannot let go, as Mars looms ever closer to earth.

We hug when she stopped her car across the street from my home, wishing each other safe journeys before parting.

I’m in my bed thinking


1) Am I good father material?

2) Will I ever get married, have children to prove it?


3) Some fertile men help make children but make lousy father’s or some are sterile yet are great nurturer’s to children not genetically their own, which am I?

4) Women it seems have a sense who is father material and who’s not; if they know what clues do men give that tells them?
And finally.

5) If I am lucky enough to be chosen by a woman to be a parent; in the quiet of a garage or bathroom if I let tears fall out my eyes because of a joy I cannot contain if my wife catches me in full flood would she think me as being weak, close a door leaving me along or join me placing her gentle hand and enfold me in her tender embrace?

These questions will remain until I become a full realized human and that means if not fatherhood then marriage sharing a life with another building or lives together.

Maybe fatherhood or marriage isn’t in the cards for me, I don’t know but if women can and do brave all kinds of mental anguish, abuse, hurts, emotional turmoil, the least I can do is be by her side; the one who chose me to be to be her mate hopefully for life and beyond.

Any Thoughts on the matter men, women, children, or young adults?


PS. Poor Magazine web site under reconstruction = reconfigured(some web designer tinkering with to improve it… again.)

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1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Ace Tafoya/PoorNewsNetwork Community Journalist

Dawn was only hours away as my sister Toni lay on her soft mattress that early Saturday morning. 'Captain Cargo", 'Fat Albert' and 'The Wacky Races' would meet my eyes yet her eyes would only see red. "Pick up those tomatoes girl," the pale supervisor said in that hot summer San Joaquin valley heat. "Make sure you pick up everything! I'm watching you!" Toni was out in the fields along with other workers picking up tomatoes. She was in her early teens.

On Saturday, September 20, San Francisco in conjunction with other cities had a march for Immigrant Rights. I, the son of poor immigrant farmworkers who was expected to join my siblings in the fields just to help my family survive joined thousands of supporters and immigrants who chanted at Yerba Buena Gardens and proceeded down Market Street in a send-off event for the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, a national movement to build support for reform of U.S. policy. Inspired by the Freedom Rides of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960's, Immigrant workers and friends will set out across the country for a series of rallies and educational forums. The buses will stop at 11 cities before arriving in Washington, DC on October 1st to meet with members of Congress. From there, the new Freedom Riders of 2003 will come to their destination of New York City for a massive rally on Saturday, October 4.

Jean Damu, a San Francisco Freedom Rider was all set for the march and the rally. "It's an important expression," he said to me before the march started. "As a Black worker, it's important to make this statement of expression and solidarity. It's an issue of color. We don't 'round up white immigrants whether legal or illegal and send them back to Europe, they (the I.N.S.) only 'round up the people of color who are immigrants." Damu was too young to participate in the first Freedom Ride, so I asked him why he wanted to make this ride. "Because my history as a worker in this country has shown that solidarity amongst workers is extremely important. All workers need to solidify. This is important in terms of globalization. Workers around the world have to express solidarity."

When the march started I asked Samantha Hynes, a local resident, what did the march mean to her. "I think this march will be a historic moment in (the) history of the U.S. I think that people will recognize this and identify with the 60's Freedom Rides." Samantha joined her friends and Tonya Miles of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionist CBTU. "It's a great event and a great initial start to really get out the information about 'No on 54' (the classification by race, ethnicity, color, or national origin initiative), and the whole thing about working together and unity." The warm air swept through the garden. "Yes, considering the crunch we're in right now, it's not possible, but definitely something we could pull the state back up as well as the nation," she responded when I asked her if the minimum wage should be increased.

The Freedom Riders plan to highlight four major issues as they journey across the country: 1) establishing a clear road for immigrants to become citizens; 2) humane and timely procedures for reunifying immigrant workers with their families; 3) improving workplace conditions for immigrants; and 4) protecting the civil rights and civil liberties of all. The festival was sponsored by The Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, a collaborative effort between community organizations, interfaith groups, labor unions and elected officials.

When we reached Civic Center/City Hall Park we we're greeted by Mariachis, African drummers, Arabic singers, Filipino stick dancers and Gray Davis. "I'm so proud to join all my colleagues on stage today to honor the new Freedom Riders," said the Governor. Standing next to him was Dolores Huerta, Co-Founder of the United Farm Workers and a national hero to me, yet he continued, "I'm proud of you taking the trip across America. I know, everywhere you go, you will spread good will, you will remind people that America's economy has been, is now, and always will be dependent on the important work immigrants do."