We are in this together. There are some inmate authored poems that should hit the web by mid next week. There are some Georgetown poems that will also go live, right about the same time. So keep those eyes peeled. The prompts that have been offered up are: an experience with, or of, injustice – and “inked” or “ink.”  I am excited to see what both groups do with that. It will be amazing to see the varied perspectives, and the shared space and thoughts. If you out there, in this wide poetry world have an idea for what we should write to, offer something up, let’s make this a bigger conversation than the one between these two groups. We welcome you to join us – write to the prompts and submit them, they will go up in the JustWrite section as “online, or real life submissions.” I appreciate your time and attention to the healing nature of poetry. Until we speak again – keep grindin’.

where is my mind
heaven or hell, I’m  stuck in a bind
do I really care, if not, then why am I trying
where is my mind, i feel my soul could leak out my eyes never crying
sadness fills a pipe faster than smoke
black, crank, crack, dank, a serious joke
funnier than having fun, hilarious how pills carry us
on their back like a monkey with needle in hand, ready to poke
your mind like the Pillsbury dough boy, the top chef
cooking up a swarm as you be twisting trouble
with your 16 year old wanna be playboy bunny thinking your hugh heff
ner na yay, will a shot gun on your tongue help you express you mind
and spread out your thought and you can find what you were going to say
about the situation of you lost in inebriation, praying to the father of drug creation
ready to bust a slug after a 10 gauge’s masturbation
boom
where is your mind, drugs treat us so kind
life is a slit throat we could watch and rewind
fear and loathing has us just pressing play
thinking about KIDS has us wearing rubbers every lay
Jesus around our neck as were requiem scheming
“somebody help us’, someone’s mind is screaming
live life like blow, die like scarface
were dreaming, our nightmare reality is us just catching another case
another date with the judge.another probation, another drug test,
another relapse, another day on the run, I see another cop, another day resisting arrest
more time, less gain, more rhymes, less sane
where is my mind, my new celly is crying
another letter. another sentence, your girl’s late on her period
and if she says that it’s yours do the math and realize she’s lying
life is so grand, death is so sweet
where is the man with the sand, leaving me forsaken as he’s off to never never land
now look me in the eyes like heat
do I really care, if not, then why am I trying
where is my mind

Horned Toad perched
on the edge of the moving box. i knelt next
to him, (k)new of tradition—

shiChei, tell me a story?

he hopped
off the cardboard and
flicked his tongue at me
before

he waddled into the grass. I found him

two days later
dead dry.
crickets creeped
out of his stomach playing
ghost songs, rising from their
legs like
smoke

through a hoghan winter.

In this melting pot
I’m just one drop
Little brown boy
All I want is one shot,

Not bucked from a nine of a twelve gauge
More like in-between the lines
Onna blank page

Three sheets to the wind
Inna mind haze

Finding simplicity and answers in the
Questions
my way

Traditions and culture still existent
Only place that when I leave I miss it
Here, you Hear the spirits if you listen

Land of enchantment where we’re living

The reason I am a

poet

is because when I was born I

was swaddled in the purple

black sky and caressed

by the warm callused hands of

New Mexico. I was given

a right to stand up for my beliefs by the bullhead

infested ditch banks who loved me

with soft dirt but kept me in reality with sharp pains.

I was given tan skin because

New Mexico has rubbed off on me.

I don’t rhyme in my poetry—

I don’t believe that I can succeed when I force-feed you

a full speed stampede of words. Instead

I use the rhythm of my mother’s heartbeat so you know these words come from me,

My right hand, is the ground pounded by dancers,

in their head dresses and regalia, pumping

creativity into my body

with their steps of

thunder echoing agony from the past,

My left hand is in a fist (I have to fight for my right to succeed),

My ears tune themselves

to myself and life. They were raised

by grandfather’s stories and grandmother’s sunset tongue of elegance.

My nose inhales Sandia Mountains.

It filters out anything but poetry.

But you and I are metaphors for Zia Sun Bliss,

My mouth exhales quietly

the uprising of the new

generation as

my tongue transforms into the feathered serpent,

Quetzalcoatl, who changes

the world into a multicolored wristband. I wear my heart on my sleeve,

a heart of black

jet. All colors mixed together in a compound so complex it is

simple,

I was created from scratch,

Birthed from Yucca root and Traditions,

My hair is of desert willow,

Eyes of bluebird flight,

Nose of bittersweet Red Chile,

Ears of Ya’at’eh, Que Tal, and Hello,

Mouth created by the riches and flaws of humanity,

My face is perfectly imperfect like the landscape that surrounds it,

My body is oddly proportioned yet seductive as the sand dunes,

My legs are strong and powerful adobe bricks built by the hard-working aspect of humanity,

My feet were not birthed but rather, created alongside life because they are the instruments that turn the world,

I wasn’t meant to sit down,

I’ve walked from the acequias to mesas,

From arroyos to Pueblos,

I was baptized in the Rio Grande,

Took first communion at Garcia’s Kitchen,

Was confirmed by Mt. Taylor, Mal Paiz, and the Sandia Mountains,

I am home, to New Mexico.