Monday, June 14, 2010

McCrack: Why Drug Dealers Would Be Better Off Working at McDonalds

My hateful pal & fellow Urban Twister, Bryan Stewart, recently came out about his crack addiction (I assume the addiction is virtual.) on facebook, prompting a conversation about the realities of the drug trade. David Simon and his crew showed us plenty of those realities with Homicide, The Corner, & The Wire, but many of the misconceptions about how lucrative the drug trade is still linger. The truth is, unless you can survive the streets long enough without getting killed or arrested as a foot soldier, you’d be better of working at McDonalds...

(Read the whole story on From the Bottom Up on The Urban Twist.)

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Villalba

 A poem about my childhood memories of the little town my folx are from in Puerto Rico:

Villalba

A shallow, little thing—
the river behind abuelita’s
house, barely deep
enough to wade in,
to slam our clothes
clean against the rocks.

Except when the hurricanes
came, we would have to
gather the chicken & geese
and stow them in the basement
praying that the great brown surge
carrying cows & cars with
equal ease would not
devour our fowl, anyway.

"¿How far does it go?"
I asked mi hermano
"Don’t know, but I hear
that upstream
the catfish get so big
you can wrestle them
out of the water—"
and so we set out,
on a day free
of hurricanes, to find that place
where the river began.

¿How far had we walked
before we realized our folly
as the current grew stronger,
a Lucha Libre wrestler shoving
us around, knocking us down
refusing us a glance under
his golden mask?

¿And the catfish?
Just as we believed, we saw
one navigating the current
more easily than we could,
its whiskers as long as it was.

I pounced, thinking, perhaps
I can have at least this
one pleasure; rocks
in my hands,
nothing more.

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Chosen

Howdy folx. I'm feeling a bit broody today, which sometimes makes for decent poetry. Here's what came out. Let me know what you think.
Chosen

I love you,
said the Universe
as she pummeled me
into the Earth,
ripped my corpse
out of the dirt
only to throw me
against weathered mountains.

I have chosen you,
She says as I slide
into cool rivers,
chosen you to show
humanity its foolish folly
its varicose vanity
its egregious ego.

I rest upon a riverbank
feeling no pain
because I am pain,
& I remember
being a child
being beaten
by my mother
beyond submission
beyond comprehension.

Afterwards
she would always hold me
in her arms, cradle me,
rock me softly,
& tell me tenderly,
I’m sorry. I do this
because I love you.
You can’t fail.
You are hope.
You are chosen.