Story Archives 2004

by Joe B.

Arnold S. The groping Governor and hundreds of other with 15% of the vote or less can be Governor of California.

This is a really bad joke and as everyone across the country has a laugh must remember it may be their turn next time around.

As for Mr. Ward Connelly of prop 187 fame is back with 54 – the so called color blind society initiative.

I wonder if in a past life as a slave an other slaves planned escaping he may have informed on massa or mistress, got people caught, killed, and said "I did it to save ‘em didn’t they’d be killed, don’t ‘na run that’s all."

I probably was one of the slaves working in the field or kitchen getting extra food and luvin from a few maids or the not thinking of escape but not ‘snitchin on others just because I didn’t want go then but that real smart slave, the always with the masta, talkin to the mistress and kids when masta’s away I didn’t trust him and warned the others what I though and told them to be careful.

I may have tried to escape was caught beaten, or made lame, I don’t know but I’m saying don’t trust W. Connelly’s 54 and young folks find out everything you can, learn, educate yourself and others, form organizations that will outlive you and help generations to come.

We’re still in the killing fields, more jails than schools, what is our value to the government?

Are we voting citizen’s, prison complex workers, bouncing betty bomb fodder, or ticking self destructive homicides bombs waiting to blow up ourselves or be blown up by others?

Young men dying too young, young girls being molested, abused, killed, growing up psychologically damaged if not physically and relating boys, men thinking of themselves and others as things not humans.

A killing field America has always been for rainbow folks now it turns on their own.

When young folks of all cultures turn from current society to create something better it’s a threatens the status quo because young people are the next generation and if they see new ways of going forward instead of the same tired old ways society changes.

The current administration or old fossil near extinct ideas that are still holding on to power even as science and technology moves beyond their oil based monies.

Vote people, especially young folks, vote and know who and what your voting for or things will never change.

Economics should priority one besides voting; we see what happens when politics without economics: The organized disenfranchisement of thousands of African descended citizens by criminalizing them on paper, losing ballots.

We must fix the penal system so as people get out of federal prisons they can regain the right to vote in days not months and years not as now losing voting rights forever.

People around the world are not going back into Bush’s 1920’s to 40’s Darkage.

Oh, there will be Dark age’s but this time the light will come from us and shine everywhere.

Dark folks and others were always the true light bearer’s as we’ve shown time and again.

Could it be a real psychological fear of a rainbow world where everyone is free, equal, no bars to how far one can go.

You’ve heard of circling the wagon’s in South Africa.

As natives attacked men and women fought sometimes to the last man or woman and if it looked like they (colonizer’s) would lose they’d kill themselves, whole families died that way and it happened to white families in South Africa as one man one vote came closer to reality.

In America it still happens.

A father loses his job, his mind spirals downward until he see’s death as his only way out.

Problem he takes out his whole family too.

We’re way past that stage, less band together, form international clubs, (youths had already at), we will get through the Bush’s, this stupid, idiot, money wasting, and more-jails-less schools years and get to balance.

You see all the tricks have been done over and over until its history and young people know it, know it so well there moving in alternate directions.

When people scatter to the for winds, split up governments cannot follow, to many people too watch, too many leaders to assassinate at one time.

We’ve gone multiple and when shoulder’s return even more leader’s will begin.

Young folks, keep learning, keep organizing and as now leaders not leaders of tomorrow its up to you.

I’m still trying to stay alive so as to tell folks what really happened way back when.

If I get killed for knowing to much oral, technical, scientific history then my killer are really a bunch of sorry MF’s because I’m no treat but those that are.

Are Everywhere and they cannot be stopped by bullets or bombs.

Ideas never die, get lost, old, reused, and renewed but they never die.

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1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

Last Saturday on Oct. 8,2003. A play "Nickel and Dimed" based on Barbara Ehrenreich’s 1999 book Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America.

The play runs from October 8th to November 9th 2003.
The BRAVA! For Women in the Arts.

Brava Theater is on 2781 24th Street in San Francisco, Ca 94110. info@brava.org

Arriving at Brava early by the 14 Mission bus made me feel relaxed, collected,rested,and ready when the play begins in an hour or so.

The time is taken taking black and white photo’s on the wall of player’s in the play. T. J. Johnson is early too with a program and complimentary tickets.

Inside the roomy downstairs theater the stage has props of pirex coffee pots on a wheeled cart, two other tables for maids, balled of paper on floors is a nice touch.

Actor/Actresses help move the scenes and props along by wheeling or moving walls that have props affixed to them.

I found out Mr. Ron Gnapp, Christina Anselmo, Ms. Julia Brother’s are smokes and its written into the play plus a q & a about maid/waitress work and who pays the highest wages for house cleaning.

I heard $33 as the highest weekly wage as everyone applauds the employer including actors who’ve do that work.

Its good to know I’m risking my lungs to second hand smoke in the cause of balanced cost-of-living increased wages.

All realistic in their use to convey the hard work of low wage unemployment of waitresses, maids, Certified Nurse/Dietary Aid Assist. and MorMart employees.

A musician, Mr. Michael Goldberg plays delicately on small guitar.

In a later interview after the play he told the music is integral to the play and not added in as part of changes.

After three intermissions Ms. Ellen Gavin, Founding Artistic Director of the Brava Theater Center in San Francisco announced that upstairs a party is set up to talk to the actress/ actor’s in the play and have food and drink.

There is white wind and its black purple twin, cookies, deserts, water, and rum cake with mushrooms at least that’s what heard in passing.

After cookies, two cakes, and talking with a few of the player I finally asked all the remaining actor’s to gather for a last group shot.

I recommend an open mind when seeing this play.

Its 12 midnight, Mission Street is nearly deserted with a few revelers and S.F.’s finest roaming about.

I decide to walk, while composing some song.

The night barely has a breeze to it as I walked home to shed a few excess pounds.

It was a good night and early morning in a few hours church and other thing will be on my mind.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

Well, Swartzenegger is Governor and looks like he and ‘Prez select G.W. Bush Jr. are going to borrow some of Arnold’s charismatic star power to have him voted in by the people for real in 2004.

Could the boxer analogy be inverted so that when Ms. Arianna Huffington was debating or arguing with the former candidate it looked like he was being picked on and no matter what he said or did to appease women about his past "youthful" Hollywood indiscretions with women most men and women thought:

["The guy cannot win either he didn’t do ‘em and he’s smeared, tried by public opinion or he did it, apologizes and gets raked over the coals for admitting it.

Yes, many men have been through the particular no-win ringer in that no matter what you do to correct whatever you’ve done its never enough.

Unlike marriage when a trust is broken its takes a hell of a strong bond to get back trust.

I think women are more unforgiving in this area.

When placing more than their bodies but hearts and soul to someone and the one person they trust has broken that vow by sleeping with another then saying "it meant nothing only sex" makes matters worse.

What is/was she to him just sex?

An though trust can be rebuilt over time it is never the same so I always warn myself when and if I’m ever blessed to be in married bliss to keep that trust because it is sacred and should never be broken at all,ever.

As for upcoming political shenanigans we’ve have not heard about all I wish to do is get my own act together.

Let me tell you a true story. In the back of my mind was the thought that if I ever became flush with dough or by inheriting funds one of my first actions would be to seriously work on my health.

It happened when my grandmother who lives on Park Avenue died from complications brought on by pneumonia. Ms. Reese died in 2000.

I only saw her a few times but missed being at her bedside before she breathed her last breath but did see her up and around before she became ill.

At the same time I was in U.C.S.F.’s [University of California,San Francisco] School of Dentistry, the
Periodontology part of it.

It deals with the gums that holds teeth in place. After scraping off plaque, food particles I’m told to keep them clean which I’ve done diligently over these few months lately I’ve come to a realization that my teeth are as equally if not more important to my health as the interior/ exterior of my physical body.

So I’ve cut down on comfort or snack foods like cookies,mini pies, cakes,candy bars,and soda.

Folks, you know that pleasant light feeling when one actually feels weight fall from your frame?

Well I’ve had that feeling on and off when regaining wait but this time around I’ve kept that lighter than air feel for four months now and I’m use to feeling no longer being a fleeting phenomena.

The next goal is to be in a gym early for swimming, weight training and Pilates Yoga, a combining of Pilates exercise invented by its founder Joseph Hubertus Pilates

was born in Duesseldorf/Germany in 1880.

Later he emigrated to England and then to the USA.... Died in 1967

The recent combining of Pilates with Yoga,an interior and ancient spiritual exercise seems a perfect balance along with lap swimming,weight training,and proper nutrition.

Don’t get me wrong I’m not going for marathons or Iron Man competition but in case that’s ever the case I may not win but be fit enough to finish at the end.

Taking a page from women on self care giving to ones self before doling it out to others.

The non profit job I work in has zero health benefits except for web knowledge, word of mouth, and what’s affordable.

I cannot afford to be ill and as with sharks constant roaming for food, eyes open rarely sleep or at rest.

I can spend maybe two or more days in bed before my lungs fill with fluids, a mild flu makes my asthma worse.

So, women when I say sex is good for me and I have endurance because I’ve done it a lot.

Its not merely sex for sex’s sake but a life enhancing act.

Though I’m not addicted to it besides exercise, its an enjoyable recreation.

Now you know why I’m not a sports fan and would rather be a lady or two in another room while the fella’s whoop and holler over a flawless touchdown, basket, golf put, or tennis, or soccer.

Guy’s can you think of a better way to keep an affliction at bay while being wholly pleasurable simultaneously?

I’ve been on adult dating sites,in electronic chat rooms but after awhile I had to leave for an even stronger sites.

One that when place my physical or written profile the women on these sights really want physical contact with little sexual innuendo, double meaning messages and also because my periodontal visits had me thinking.

I better be real to these women,tell‘em what their in for and maybe its one nighter’s but at least its above board and if I should find a mate there well I’ll have to give up that indulgence for life.

Well, folks its been a harsh hard year with lowered
I Q’s up in Washing-toon and all over the country.

Meanwhile between my teeth and body along with more Salsa, Meringue dancing I’ll be so busy living life I won’t really think much of politics.

Yeah, the personal is political but what was personal when politics didn’t exist? Just personal life.

For Pol all I do is look, read, listen, vote, I do not talk Pol, religion, or sexual pol because not only am I lousy at it but some people are so into it they tend to want to bring others into it like some "Stepford Wifes" drones.

I may comment on politics once in a while but my radar isn’t focussed there as I am at other issues.

If you like, dislike, hate my views email me sometimes.

There are some people who hate POOR Magazine so much that they email us to express there view.

To me it seems we’re a threat to their ideological/political landscape,Poor peeps being poor are suppose to shut up and take whatever they get and deem themselves lucky.

Most people are poor that hasn’t changed what’s changed is poor folks are more educated, skilled, then at anytime in the past.

Too many know the lies, falsehoods, history and we’ve spread to the youth who are doing and demanding more at younger ages.

Parameter’s have changed forever and the Powers That Be don’t know what to do because they no longer have control.

I only listen with half an ear then do my own stuff.

What about you reader’s out there how do you feel about it?

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

Someone’s Birthday today,Monday,Oct.20,2003.

At the ripe old age of 22 the individual has been through a lot of tough times which has taken a heavy tool both physically and psychically.

Seeing a live in perspective it’s a wonder that childhood nearly denied early is being lived to the fullest now.

My childhood wasn’t as traumatic it was slightly later that harsh realities torn to shreds human decency for me.

For another thrown in adult situations,making adult decisions,forced to be ready,and between adult men and young boys of all orientations is even more vicarious sometimes causes the height of joys to low rungs of despair, desperation.

Love has not been kind this kind hearted, bull blooded, mixed race soul wandering through lusts ruinous designs yet continues conquering finding others to fill aching human needs.

Birthdays, normally last but a single day and no more.

But from Friday to Sunday to two day is for this special one a pre 3- day occasion.

Though we know about the "All About Me" syndrome its rare seeing it in full blown form.

Just in case when the magic day of birth finally arrives it will be over and done unless the week is included as an extended "Me" days to come until next Sunday!

Wherever one goes, either bungie jumping, horseback riding in far-from-City accommodations.

Whatever gifts, friends, visits, or toys one gets for a wondrous days of one’s birth should last but for a day any
more than that is simply too much of a good thing.

So for a special one born on this day.

Remember just because you are special does not extend to days before birth but only on day of birth.

I repeat, "You Are Special the day you were born on is not.

Where is special one, missing in action, probably into or having lots of action.

Being such giving/receiving soul though these days wants to mainly receive goodies not ‘workin up a sweat if you get my drift readers.

I’ve said enough having told what little I know.

All is well, sometimes hell, we all move on though memories dwell.
HAPPY BIRTH DAY R.M.V. may all your years of promise be filled and remain rich.
Your humble unassuming friend Joe.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

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 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 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 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."

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.

Music Hall Nite

It’s the Matt Gonzalez Benefit Concert in American Music,located at 859 O' Farrell Street in San Francisco.

It’s a first for me to being inside usually I pass by it at night after work seeing people young and old milling outside talking,buying or asking to buy tickets,and huge tour busses or a truck unloading musical instruments,amplifiers, mikes,and carrying wires inside the place.

But this time being a ‘Po Poet myself I have an in or free ride to enter.

My nerves begin jangling,time seems to telescope down to me and being early becomes absurdly urgent.

I guess it stems from the first time I missed a play in New York my Aunt had tickets for and I left late from my apartment on Marian Avenue,got lost and returned home.

Its when I found I had no sense of direction.

It’s drizzle Ciz’ translation(drizzling rain in City)San Francisco.

All day I looked for other short poems other than slam bio which is a quick take on the individual reciting the slam.

Its always changing as I try making it shorter.

Free lunch at St. Anthony’s is a vegetarian affair while Glide has turkey and dressing.

One dinner suffering a seizure, the woman across from me saw blood.
[He might have bit his tongue or hit his head when he fell from the lunch table?]

Though we both felt sorry for the guy and slightly ill we both had 2nds and 3rds of the vegi-feast before I decide having enough.

I called friends some call back,one still part of the ‘Po Poets couldn’t make the Matt Gonzalez Benefit Concert.

At least my sense of direction improved slightly over time and the place is close to where I live.

The Matt Gonzalez For Mayor C A K E.

Now for something slightly different.

I’m so far from music scene that the ["My milkshake brings the boys the yard,damn its better in yours."]
Sounds as if its female brag rap or telling her personal truth.

I wonder,the song is so fast,it’s a nice song and all but will folks be singing it in a decade or two or will it become a children’s jump rope song with boys play marbles or darts singing it too?

"Evanescence’s Fallen"

Is like science fiction,heroine frozen by science or dark magic from without creating a stasis field inside her until a hero with enough lust, love,caring,and heat can burn through the outer and inner layers of ice and ignite her frozen passion.

But the hero does not have to work too hard because in her deepest self she wants to be rescued.

As for "HoodRat" Well, all I’ll say is maybe I’ve been deprived of the deep real "love-me and I’ll love-you-damn good-heave/ hell and back kind of love only sister’s reserve for bro’s who want,need,and won’t reject them for it in macho asshole ways –

Dear Queens, Princesses,and hard workin’s women,I’m starved for it I ain’t shamed admitting it.

Yeah,I strayed off subject.

In the American Music Hall are people I don’t know staring before and after the ‘Po Poets.

They are Jonathan Richman, Chuck Prophet and Stephanie Finch. [I liked their rendition of do right all day woman, do right all night man. the crowd loved it too.

Jua Featuring Mama Earth,Sonny Smith. Finally in between the acts is ‘Po Poets consisting of Tiny, Leroy Moore, Charles Pitts, Poor Poet Laureate A. Faye Hicks, and Joseph Bolden.

It was quick slam bio’s and two other poems of poverty with a slant on the political scene by Mr. Moore.

We finished, went to restroom, and some of us stayed awhile handing out flyers among the audience both down and upstairs.

It’s a popular place the Great America Music Hall I do not know it history but I’ll try to be in it because of its beautiful gold ceiling, large dance floor,foods, some beer,and its close to where I live.

Just as with many deep abiding pleasures I have been severely deprived and must get all the best that is possible from it.

I was calmed,felt welcomed,it is a spiritual space.

It feels sacred, peaceful,and welcoming place to sing,dance,pray, sit,eat,and otherwise enjoy ones humanity and others in a humane, peaceful setting.


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San Francisco, CA 94103

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