Story Archives

Donna Valiente

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
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Donna Valiente, 48; activist and poet was a vocal advocate for aid to homeless on L.A.'s skid row.

by Jocelyn Y. Steward/LA Times Staff Writer

In her fight for the dignity of homeless people in downtown Los Angeles, Donna Valiente chose two methods: direct confrontation and prayer.

By day she was a firebrand, speaking out at City Hall, and during demonstrations, making her voice heard to officialdom. At night she made her voice heard to God.

At an office on Main Street, between 4th and 5th streets, she and other skid row residents gathered each Wednesday to pray for their community, for the day when those who are now homeless will be able to stand at an apartment window and say, "I used to sleep on those streets."

"Donna had that vision," said Brother James Upshaw, a friend and downtown resident, and she believed both methods would help her achieve it.

On Feb. 13, Valiente was found dead in a skid row hotel of what is believed to be natural causes. Her death comes at a time when the 48-year-old had increased her presence at City Hall and the Los Angeles Police Commission.

"She would come wheeling up the aisle in her wheelchair, I'm sure they were expecting some very quiet voice," said Pete White, executive director of the Los Angeles Community Action Network, a nonprofit group that works on behalf of the homeless and poor in downtown Los Angeles, of which Valiente was a member. Instead "you have this lioness roaring from her wheelchair."

As an activist she joined an anti-domestic violence campaign for downtown women. She also pushed to keep downtown hotels — such as the one she lived in — as affordable housing.

An artist and a poet, Valiente sometimes used her art to express her concerns about the homeless. Earlier this month at a meeting of the Los Angeles Police Commission she "denounced police abuse and mistreatment of downtown residents," White said. She read her poem "The Shackles Must Come Off":

What if by some odd chance it was all happening to you?

Would you not stand up for what you know is right and true?"

Born July 8, 1958, in Santa Barbara, Valiente grew up in Ventura and graduated from Santa Paula High School. An entrepreneur, she operated several businesses, including T. Liberty Rose Maid Service, said her daughter, Barbra Marquez. In addition to Marquez, Valiente is survived by her mother, Carolynn Klouse, of Bend, Ore.; a son, Christopher Rader; a daughter, Liberty Rader, and five grandchildren, all of Los Angeles.

About 15 years ago she was driving on the freeway when she collided with a jackknifed truck, leaving her seriously injured. A surgery years later didn't alleviate the problem and "finally she had to be put in the wheelchair because she couldn't walk without being in excruciating pain," Marquez said.

Unable to work, Valiente lost her apartment and ended up in a skid row hotel. Faith had always been important in her life, but sometimes she would fall into drug use, her daughter said. While living downtown she gained sobriety and stayed in the community.

"She felt that's where her calling was, she needed to help people downtown," Marquez said.

On the streets she handed out her poetry or handmade crosses. And when people marveled at her work, she would say, "If I can do it, then others can do it also," said Montgomery Garnett, a friend and resident of downtown Los Angeles. "She would have made a great motivational speaker."

Speaking up on behalf of the homeless was not a matter of radicalism but a by-product of Valiente's simple belief that things could be better. The weekly prayer meeting that she organized at the L.A. Community Action Network office on Main Street stemmed from that belief as well.

"There's a lot of blessed people on skid row," Upshaw said. "Where there is darkness, light that much more abides. It was proven in the life of Donna."

*

jocelyn.stewart@latimes.com

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He Had Gold Records I had Gold Chains-RIP Micheal Jackson

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
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Tribute by RAM/Po Poets Project at POOR Magazine

by Staff Writer

from age six to sixteen

we shared the same styles

we both grew out of it

but he had it a longer while

I bought his jacket

'wit only one working pocket

his was red and mine was black-

and it didn't even zip

he had southern roots

before did the RAM

Both of us are internationally expanded

He sang everywhere

just I in the shower

both performed dancing

but he back-slid his power

he had a long curl

and I had long dreads

we both got bird chests

like we were raised just off of bread

he had gold records

and I wore gold chains

I don't know which one of both

our families is the most crazy insane

he was truly loved

as so am I

we both proved success is possible

if you just try

RIP to Michael Jackson

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Tow Away

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
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by Husayn Sayfuddiyn


To the poor - a

mobile home

has new meaning


Life’s Blood on Wheels

Fancier than the

shopping carts

of the ne’er do wells

until SFPD stopped me

as unlicensed to live

illegal necessities

unwanted baggage

to Tow Away

and I saw in his steel eyes

that I was next

on the Tow Away list.

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A Mama's Love..

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
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Lula Bell Seymour aka Mama, an African-American houseless elder passes away in the Tenderloin - loved by all who she touched

by Valerie Schwartz/PoorNewsNetwork Community Journalist and Poverty Scholar

I Remember my Mama

In the Bean field, The Potato field

Sending us to school to learn our A B C’s

Keeping the Camp Fire’s Burning

We did not know Much about city livin’

In fact I didn’t know much ;of anythin’

Except a Mother’s Love

If we did without

It was with Style and Grace

No Complaints

Doing without was no disgrace

As I sit here reminissin'- Life goin on by

I have Strength and Courage

Instilled in me!

For times of sorrow

And times of joy

Although I shed tears, I Radiate Joy

When I am Low I remember my Mama....

excerpt from the poem My Mama My Ancestor by A. Faye Hicks/Po' Poets Project

About two-years ago on a somewhat hazy morning in the Tenderloin, the sun was ambivalent about trying to make an appearance on the 200 block of Hyde Street. I was reclining against the fence. I was sick and could barely move and the light that shone on me was from Lula B. Seymore, better known as Mama. "What's wrong, Sugar?" she asked me with that sweet voice that was always maternal and then added, "It's not like you to be laying down out here." I had a staff infection that was attempting a coup d' etat on my right leg, which I have ongoing vascular trouble/ulcers with. Mama went to her van and got out some aspirin, peroxide, ointment, and some clean socks and jeans for me. I managed to get up and go to the store to buy some Band-Aids with money she had given me. We talked for a while and when I felt strong enough, she then sent me packing down the street, care-package in hand, with instructions to, "Go get cleaned up and come back up here." Although I barely had the energy, I followed the instructions given and back to the corner I went. This is only one of many times that Mama helped me.

I can't remember exactly when it was that I met Mama, an African-American elder, who had resided in the Bayview-Hunters Point district of San Francisco for several years working as a housekeeper for Children's Hospital, among other labor intensive jobs, before she became houseless or what we at POOR call, "Vehicularily Housed." It seems as though I had seen her around the Tenderloin and adjoining Market St. area for awhile. I would give a "guesstimate" it was the spring of 1998 when we first actually talked. It was on the corner of Hyde and Turk. This corner was a veritable sidewalk-mall whose proprietors were primarily homeless people. I have lived in the Tenderloin neighborhood for twenty-two years and therefore I know it very well. It has a high rate of crime, addiction, and despair as most areas of poverty do.

On that fateful day, my co-worker was inside the copy shop next to the Midori Hotel at Turk and Hyde streets getting copies made for my boss at the time; we did all the maintenance, painting, and whatever else was needed to be done in a nearby apartment building. As I waited, I sat on a milk crate playing some blues tunes on my guitar when Mama stepped out of the front door of her home, a dark green van. She made eye contact with me and gave a short but hearty little laugh while straightening her wig and said, " Hello, I'm Mama...That's what we need around here... a little music to soothe ourselves, praise the Lord." Mama then started, while humming, to set up her little sidewalk re-creation of a Goodwill store. She set down some blankets and then set the clothes and miscellaneous items she had to sell on top of them. We talked for a few minutes as she swept the sidewalk around her "store" and then it was time for me to get back to work.

After our first discussion, most every time I was on the corner, Mama and I would talk or exchange our "hellos" in passing. We forged a friendship on that corner. I started taking all the things that the former tenants had left behind or threw out and gave them to her so she could sell them, rather than take it to the dump. Eventually my boss became ill, was hospitalized, and I was back on the street again. Mama helped me through those times when I needed it and when I didn't.

Mama dealt with being poor everyday. When you are poor there are no days off. She fed and gave clothing to many of us who were, and still, are out there living on the streets. I remember how she used to pull out her little barbecue grill and make everything she could with what she had: soups, a pot of beans, sometimes chicken. She always shared with someone. Mama would not allow people to get high or sell dope next to her van. I remember her frustration with people sometimes; she also would never curse, but prayed instead. Mama always prayed, she prayed for everyone, myself included, and pray she did. Her faith was unyielding. There were days when she was hurt and angered with me for I was such a slave to my addiction. She wouldn't speak to me, or would tell me to come back later, and that was enough to shame me in ways that many could not. I'd walk away and she would tell me, "You got to fight those demons girl...now go." And as I walked I could hear her praying...

Rarely would anyone talk crazy to Mama, for most of us out there respected her and helped her in return. We wasn't havin' no-one "dis" Mama! I had seen the police give her tickets for selling her wares on the sidewalk without a permit. Some of them left her alone but when she would see them coming she got busy and put everything away quickly, and then they might still give her a parking ticket. I also know that some of the police used to "hassle" her for living in her van. Mama did not want to live in a "care-facility" and unfortunately I am afraid that she, as many elders do, felt it was not a choice.

As a person who is disabled, has been homeless, and is poor I have to stop and think about choices. Choices for elders, for the poor, and disabled are not always what I would consider to be choices. They mean having to choose between two-or-more evils. These "choices" are offered by systems that perpetuate poverty. Is it a choice for a person to live in a care facility where they are subject to many different kinds of neglect or suffer a houseless poverty? Is there a choice for elders who are forced into conservatorship by the county, such as Beatrice Sloan of Oakland (another African-American elder confined to a care facility and robbed of her assets by Government programs set up to "care for" elders which POOR Magazine has been advocating for)? Writes my colleague Ashley of POOR, " The nursing home industry is another form of big business disguised as hellthcare." Thus our elders are losing what they have worked earnestly and hard to keep and maintain: A family, a good home and integrity.

When I had the pleasure of attending Mama's memorial service last week, presented by the Faithful Fools Street Ministry where several family and friends spoke and presented words of grace in Mama's memory, more questions arose: Why did Mama have to leave after residing in her Bayview-Hunter's Point home for so long and what made her "choose" to live in her van? Some reports say that she was evicted due to an Owner-Move-In- Eviction. Some say it was her choice because she didn't want to live in a care facility. Was Mama facing a possible case management or conservatorship issue? Being told that she was a "very independent person", for me, does not answer the question, because of course, for poor folks, there is always the issue of shame. This society tells us it is bad to be poor - that something is wrong with you - not the people evicting you - not the system taking your assets - redlining your districts, employing you at nothing wages, and then criminalizing your poverty.

Being that I was in the dregs of my addiction I used to find myself in awe of Mama sometimes, that she had good boundaries and kept her faith intact. It just blew my mind that a homeless senior woman, alone, could deal with life out there knowing how harsh and just plain miserable it can often be and maintain a sort of grace, you might say. Yet, she never gave up. And on many days she inspired me to make it through another day in hell with just one of her beautiful grins, her intense, smiling brown eyes, and herself saying, "You stay outta trouble." There have been times since I have been in treatment that I wanted to go talk to Mama and let her know that I was okay. Today I want her to know that some of her prayers most assuredly have been answered, that I have been clean and drug-free for a year, and how very grateful I am for her friendship, love, and boundaries that I now understand. Mama's presence and spirit was always a beacon of light in the tempest of the Tenderloin and she will be missed and remembered by many.

PNN editors note; Mama was a contributor to POOR Magazine vol#4 MOTHERS, and will be included in the Poverty Heroes Anthology which will be released by POOR Press in December -as well, she was a powerful inspiration and friend to POOR mother and daughter editors, Dee and Tiny. If you would like to submit any words or art to POOR about Mama - please call us at (415) 863-6306 - if you would like to visit the Memorial Green Van - you can reach the Faithful Fools at (415) 474-0508 or go to the corner of Hyde and Turk street

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bare minimum necessities

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
Original Author
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The ACLU lodges lawsuit against The State
of California for unjust distribution of
wealth in California school districts.

by Kaponda

The zephyr bored through the thin layer of protective
shelter and pelted the young lad as his eyes opened to
the dawn of another school day. It carried the noxious
elements of the naval shipyard to woo the uncorrupt
lungs of the middle school senior. Yet, Jimmy has
known for quite awhile that his generation has had to
endure the brunt of unfulfilled commitments by
virtually every institution of America.

The sparse surroundings of Jimmy's bedroom
bounced off his eyes through the mirror, as he
prepared to encounter another struggle at Luther
Burbank Middle School. In an effort not to frustrate
his schoolmaster, Jimmy had begun his journey at the
customary time. Looking at the abutting structures
from the window, Jimmy watched as his house
drowned in the distance, as the bus accelerated past
the density of drab houses. He mused over whether
anyone within that enclave of southern migrants --
from which he, too, is a proud product ñ- has ever
enjoyed anything other than substandard living
conditions since their arrival to the Bayview-Hunters
Point District at the height of World War II.

As he expectorated the noxious residuals from the
wind that had earlier swirled around his residential
community, Jimmy peered at a rodent, which bolted
off into a separate entrance of the Luther Burbank
Middle School. His eyes made a futile search of the
halls for anything that had not been riddled by decay.
The first battle for Jimmy will be to find a seat after
he enters his classroom, as there are not enough to
accommodate each student. There will not be a need
for him to check his coat because it will help insulate
him from the extremely cold classroom due to the
broken heating system. Jimmy has always focused on
completing his studies and passing his advanced
placement examination to continue his education at a
competitive university.

The substandard learning and living conditions to
which Jimmy is exposed may pose a threat to his
plans to further his education. For example, the
curricula offered at schools such as Luther Burbank
do not adequately prepare Jimmy for advanced
placement examinations. In addition, his problems are
compounded by a sense of inferiority, which affects
the motivation of a child to learn. These wretched
conditions were not hatched over night. Rather, they
are the result of years of Federal and State neglect.
Furthermore, these substandard learning conditions --
in which Jimmy must struggle to realize his hopes ñ
violate the laws of California, which require the State
to ensure the delivery of basic educational
opportunities for every child in California and vest the
State with ultimate responsibility for the Stateís public
elementary and secondary school system.

Neglect by the State of California to improve substandard
learning conditions in schools for people of color can be
traced as far back as the early 1950ís, when the majority of
schools for people of color were far inferior to the schools
of their white counterparts. The neglect of the State of
California to provide equal access to public education
regardless of race, color or national origin is rooted in the
May 17, 1954, Brown v. Board of Education, unanimous
decision, read by Chief Justice Earl Warren of the Supreme
Court.

In California, schools in economically disadvantaged
communities were underserved so severely that on May
17, 2000, the 46th anniversary of Brown vs. Board of
Education, civil rights groups and attorneys in California,
coordinated by the American Civil Liberties Union, lodged
a historic class-action lawsuit on behalf of students in 18
schools. The lawsuit charges that California has failed to
provide the "bare minimum necessities" required for an
education. According to the Complaint, the state of
California has allegedly "...reneged on its constitutional
guarantee to provide all students with at least the bare
essentials necessary for an education...."

The indictment of gross negligence underscores the reason
that supports the probability that Jimmy will never achieve
an education comparable to that of his white counterpart.
Furthermore, people of color in schools throughout
California have been subjected to the following conditions
as part of their everyday educational experience, according
to the Complaint:

  • Lack of Materials and Basic Resources;
  • Inadequate Instruction; and
  • Massive Overcrowding.

California has recently adopted a system of statewide
educational standards. It entails a criterion that must be
satisfied by each student before being promoted to the next
rung of learning. However, ìofficials of the state of
California charged with carrying out educational
obligations have failed to develop or implement appropriate
procedures to identify and correct the substandard
conditions at the schools attended by Plaintiffs,î according
to the Complaint.

Furthermore, according to the class-action lawsuit lodged
by the ACLU, ìAlthough the State has established
academic standards that students must meet, the State has
failed to meet its responsibility to ensure that schools
provide teachers who are adequately trained to prepare
students to satisfy those standards, has failed to provide
sufficient materials to enable students to have a reasonable
chance to pass tests that measure their performance, and
has failed to provide facilities in which students can safely
learn the materials they need to meet the State-mandated
standards. In other words, the State has established a
system for education but has abdicated its responsibility to
oversee and superintend that system to ensure it functions.

Jimmy was not born during the decision of Brown v.
Board of Education by the Supreme Court. However, the
Board of Education of California continues to preclude him
from any hope of attaining to the same educational level of
equality and justice as his white counterpart. Through
sheer determination, Jimmy may be one of the few among
people of color who succeed in passing the Advanced
Placement examination by rising beyond the seemingly
insurmountable obstacles of inadequate instructions,
massive school overcrowding, too few textbooks, no
access to libraries, as few as 13 percent of teachers with
full teaching credentials, chronically unfilled teacher
vacancies, and substandard living conditions.

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"I Am" Muteado

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
Original Author
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by Mission Resistors

When I was six, I remember the smell of fried oil in the air and the smog that surrounded my young lungs. We had arrived in Tijuana, where I saw people selling, dealing and stealing all kinds of stuff. It was my two sisters, my mother and me waiting anxiously in a busy intersection where people were running and rushing up and down like the migra had arrived.

I overheard my mother talking on the public pay phone where we were waiting for the coyote or smuggler. I could hear the coyote on the phone ask my mother: “Bueno, ¿donde estan señora?”

She responded with a broken voice: “Estamos en la avenida primera y la central.” The coyote was the area and was going to pick us up. My mother asked: “¿Vino la muchacha con usted?” She wanted the coyote to bring a female smuggler, because she heard of incidents where the male coyotes were molesting women going to the United States and she was afraid it would happen to her and my sisters.

Here in Amerikkka, it seems that fear is a part of life for migrant Raza. When it is not ICE raids, it is sobriety checkpoints set up by the Police in migrant communities like my own to criminalize us when they are supposed to protect and serve us. I remember before the last May 1st march in 2008, an ICE van was parked in front of La Clinica de la Raza in Oakland and a lot of people from the community did not show up for their medical appointments, afraid that they would get deported. This reminded me of the fear and anxiety that I felt as a young boy when we were waiting for the coyote in Tijuana.

Now, the U.S. Government is trying to put a new law in place that would not only deny basic healthcare for migrant Raza, but also make it impossible for my community to access basic human rights to healthcare for their families. I can see the fear and anxiety that my community is going through by being targeted and crimalized by the authorities more and more each day. As a migrant scholar, I feel it myself and every time I leave my apartment.

I hope I make it back…

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I AM TIRED OF BEING A SLAVE...

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
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by QUEENNANDI

by Queennandi XSheba & RAM

I am tired of being a slave. A slave that has to work with a broken body that’s sacrificed

Just to put food on the table. 

A slave who had to lay to rest a demised family, disrespected by tha world

Gone forever without justice. 

I am tired of being a slave to the kourt Sssystem, where my terrible cries for help falls upon deaf ears

Life tampered with and tortured before leaving out, laughed at and ridiculed.

As my rights are stripped from me easily, like a loose fitting garment. 

If I can’t protect myself and my family, WHAT AM I? WHO AM I? Nothing but a empty shell existing for profit, robbed of something that takes a LIFETIME to restore-


                                        MY WOMANHOOD! 


Don’t I sound like a female slave, captured centuries ago??? And they said HERSTORY doesn’t repeat itself… 

I am tired of being a slave, who at 7 months pregnant was beaten by officers Miller and Shea…

If there were no witnesses, I’d be dead in my grave. 

IS THIS THE LAND THAT THE LORD HAVE MADE?

Shot dead was my unarmed neighbor just the other day. Now Oscar Grant lies beside him in a King’s  marked grave… 

But… ALL THE UNJUST SPIRITS SHALL RISE!!! To tell their stories through US!

POSSESS MY VESSEL!!! I am tired of being a slave… I just want to be!!! 


QUEENNANDI09- ALL POWER!!! 

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Options...?

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
Original Author
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A Photo Essay for Those Who May Not Know Where They Will Sleep Tonight...

by Juan Antonio Pacheco

How can I start this? From the now I guess.

Well, here I am starting my fifty-fifth year, doing close to what I damn well please, and, oh yeah, spending most nights in my van. Yes, I can say I paid my dues. Work, kids, and a failed marriage are all part of my past and present. I can also say I attend Cal State Long Beach, where I am preparing myself to teach and develop a career as a documentary photographer. This all sounds great right, well, some problems have arisen!

"You need roots," my daughter, and others have told me. Roots, I thought I had roots. My children and grandchildren are my roots.

You need, "to get on your feet," someone just remarked. Hell, I have been saying this to others, and myself, all of my life. Planning ahead is one of the major factors in a successful life. I say this all the time. Do I really know what I am talking about? How many of us actually live just for today? Very few, and not without good reason . See, there I go again!. Therefore, I have embarked upon this path. I would like to share some photos with you, and hopefully gain some wisdom along the way.

I would like to call my present lifestyle choice, for the lack of a better term, "a study" in simplification. The anti establishment, anti materialistic, and anti-authority mentality is often expressed by a choice to live within the “creases” of society. Being homeless is one of those creases. Homelessness, from my conversations with some who are, has three root causes. One is economic, the other mental health, and for some, an expression of a “freedom of choice”. A freedom from the constraints of “establishment” dictates and mores. These circumstances, as in many circumstances we may find ourselves in, has its roots and consequences. I would like to experience, address, and report on those consequences through my images and text.

I am not attempting to produce neither "works of art" within the guidelines of postmodern aesthetics, nor art criticism. My main interest is dealing with the importance of one's most basic daily needs—food, shelter from the elements, security, and surprisingly, basic human contact, or a sharing of communal space with others whom we feel care about us. These needs are often denied the truly homeless. I feel I must be particularly sensitive to the issues discussed and the images produced, hence: a self-analysis was the best solution. Empathy through self-immersion is the best way I can describe the approach to my subject matter. I am not in any way trying to pass myself off as an “expert”. Thanks for the opportunity to serve, and for providing an audience for my work.

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June Jordan's Legacy Lives. Being Black, American and male still a 90/10 Death Sentence.

09/24/2021 - 11:44 by Anonymous (not verified)
Original Author
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All I want is to outlive
america's deadly bullshit.

Black Males and Females still
walk tight ropes way of life...

We've survived, thrived ameri's
worst of Mr. and Ms.Ameri's tricks.

Too many know her smiling
skulls darkside.

by Joe B.

June Jordan’s Legacies Live.

Wednesday, April 30, 2003 in U.C. Berkeley’s Barrow’s Hall people gather for a special night of celebration as youthful wordsmiths gather in strength and force guided by June Jordan.

June Jordan.

She was a Professor of African American Studies at the University of California at Berkeley where she directed the enormously popular Poetry For the People program. Poetry For the Peoplereceived a Chancellor's Recognition for Community Partnership on September 19, 2000.

Jordan, an award-winning poet, professor and activist, are mourning her loss.

After battling cancer since the 1970s, Jordan died Friday at age 65.

She is an award-winning poet, professor and activist, novelist, essayist.

It'll take more pages to list all that she is an has done and lives change both personally and through her powerful, lyrical works. Italics mine.

As a professor of African American studies at UC Berkeley, Jordan founded and directed "Poetry For The People," a course in which 150 undergraduates participate in marathon poetry readings
before large audiences.

They also study the poetry of African Americans, Arabs and Arab Americans and many other groups Jordan considered generally overlooked in the classroom.

Jordan is survived by her son, Christopher Meyer.

"Though the master has moved on," said Reed, "the Jordan school of poetry, I suspect, will be with us for a long time. This is her legacy,"

Thanks to: Ms. Kathleen Maclay, Media Relations.
(Taken from the June 17, 2002.
www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases)

Jordan’s Legacy Continues.
From 1973 to 2003 30 years of evolving spoken word power.

As usual I here bits of news about it but its peripherally a micro dot way in the real of this near empty brain pan.

It’s on a Wednesday.

(wouldn’t you know it my day off after doing yoga practice in S.F.’s City College and getting a healthy African descended woman using a hacksaw to break my own lock, seems I locked the key in locker.

After that bit dodo brain wit I race home to shower and wear clean clothes, no lunch.

I’m looking forward to one on one with someone in Berkeley after the KPFA radio program.

Called and called no answer only to find out later that she and her sister were going to a baby shower later that day.

After the show wrapped close to 5 pm. called again mostly forgot that a Poor M’s intern is one of the poet’s speaking in Barrow’s Hall in U.C. Berkeley.

I decide to stay until 6 pm. Lost of youth helped setting up sound systems, food, and chairs some by the poets themselves.

I wait, get a seat and save a few for guests who said they were coming.

So many heart searing emotional/physical pain of women from family, culture, men, women, plus rumor and speculation of strangers.

One guy did a sensuous, deliriously, delicious tome on eating fruit that made the young and older women swoon and I never looking or eating fruit as just an ordinary undertaking ever again.

(I should’ve learned that from tongue lashing strawberry ice cream cones on Market and Polk Streets).

The event is worth missing some delayed physical pleasure in the night.

Only one guest shows the other is sick waiting in the car.

I wanted to stay but before leaving kissed her hand, hugged, praising Christina for her work using action instead of words conveying how her words said to me.

A place I always passe as a kid but never went in was open where people danced slow, steady, and close won’t try to pronounce the name buts in Berkeley far from my friends home as I find out by walking.

After three dances and being whipped about by a young, strong, pregnant woman (I swear she has the strength of Hera, an angry, jealous Greek Goddess, wife of Zeus who couldn't keep his godhead under his robes).

Called a last time then left Super Mother to be walking into the night toward a good time and maybe afterwards sleep.

Christina’s words came to me as I near Berkeley High School.

As shadowy figures appear I keep my hands swinging empty knowing that sudden movements, jerks, can mean bullets or a blade in my gut.

Wary, I walk slow smiling to young and old men walking or standing on the street, near bars, and bus stops.

I cannot forget for a second I’m a black man, male in America and can be killed either by accident of identity, by police or rival gang’s even a group of women can take unfocused rage out on me if I give the wrong signal while on their path.

Finally after reading R. I. P.’s on a stop sign at one the safety zones to slow down traffic I go up the door aware of two police officers male and female both white as I pass them my hands out slowly swinging.

The car is there after three knocks I leave then turn to knock one a last time. (why am I out here in the pitch black of 10:07 pm because of a chance of flesh on flesh, head knocking bed-board, high energy dehydrating rock solid body rocking soul meshing, brain numbing pleasure.)

You know the answer people.

I pass the cops seeing them, hands in pockets not looking at them as if there invisible.

‘Damn, its still a dangerous for black men in America and I’m a timid guy not basher of women or anyone else just a regular mortal man ‘walkin with blood veined swelling refusing to ease up.

Walked to bart and down on bench a small white woman.

("Don’t go sit near her, it’s late at night, she’s alone, don’t know what’s she thinking how she’ll react just stand and wait for the Colma/Daily City train).

Another white woman sits by the first and I wasn’t going to sit by them no matter how tired my feet are and besides my helmet head is still vibrating
up/down, back and forward twitching, pressing urgently this wasn’t a before bed, bathroom urge, or morning urination urge but the primal only a woman’s primal secreted flesh and juicy slick wet can help calm down but not tonight just full arousal frustration.

I’m gonna let it deflate on its own and let it/me suffer as a lesson to not do stupid things that can get me killed.

Still some things are worth missing besides it would take me and hour or so to release and sleep was beating us both.

Helmet lost the fight and the bigger brain learns to control its smaller reptile one.
Ladies, Women, Youthful Adults.

I’ve been accused of writing porn.

Please tell me if that is true and how can I avoid it if I do. Bye.

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