Hello and welcome to our Beat Within community across the country and beyond! It’s a pleasure to have you with us for this latest issue, where incarcerated youth and adults share their perspectives, dreams, and important messages for the world at the large. We have our good friend and colleague OT with us for our editorial note, who writes in depth about one of our weekly topics, “My Kind of Weather.” It was such a pleasure getting to know the types of weather that our writers identify with, as it signifies our deeper personality traits and the way we relate
Continue ReadingAuthor: mpau@thebeatwithin.org
What We Deserve
-Professor Fatback, Santa Cruz I feel like things that all humans deserve are free health care and clothes. Yes, I understand that people gotta work for that stuff, but to be honest, those two things should be free and even food. Another thing I think people deserve is the truth, no matter what and even if it’s gonna hurt someone or help them. Everyone deserves to know the truth. I also feel that everyone deserves to be loved, genuinely loved by someone. Not fake love where they say I love you here and there. I’m talking about someone you can
Continue ReadingGot Me Back on My Feet
-YM, Albuquerque I had a few teachers in my life. My first teachers were my mom and dad. They always showed me right from wrong, and how to treat the people you love or respect. They also taught me how to love. I appreciate them a lot for that. My other teachers have been my big brothers. My first big brother is my blood. We have the same mom. I’m not gonna say his name because he wouldn’t want me to, but he taught me how to be a man, he and my dad did. He taught me to stand
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-Gabriel, Santa Cruz I deserve to be home with my family. So far, I’ve been trying my absolute best, but I keep finding myself in situations. I just wanna move on with life and move on with probation. I’m sad to see myself back here. I was doing so good, almost off probation. I wish I woulda thought about my actions before doing what I did. If I do get released, I wanna engage in sports to keep me occupied with my day and I just wanna prove I can do good and successfully get off probation. I wish I
Continue ReadingMy CGA Experience as a Facilitator: Taking the Mask Off
-Hugo, California Health Care Facility in Stockton, CA During my thirty plus years of incarceration, I made a life changing decision in 2013 when I joined CGA’s Correspondence/Prep Program, while being housed in the SHU Program at Pelican Bay State Prison. In the first assignments that I received, I quickly realized that CGA was attacking the conditioning and beliefs that have been instilled in me through this lifestyle. For so many years I have been tricked into believing that gangsters don’t snitch, nor do they divulge any information revolving their constitution. Knowing from an early age that joining a gang
Continue ReadingA Safe Space to Dwell
-André, California Medical Facility, Vacaville, CA “Darkness cannot drive away darkness, only light can do that.” Martin Luther King Jr. The longer I live, the more I understand this quote. Most of my life, I have been fighting hate with hate, violence with violence, tit for tat, etc. That pattern and cycle of dealing with the “darkness” has never produced the desired outcome I was looking for. Being in prison, most people believe the only way to survive is to adopt the long-lasting culture already in place. That norm only produces racist, antisocial, cruel, uneducated, criminal minded, emotionally broken individuals.
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Volume 30.05/06
Please contact Lisa Lavaysse if you would like to purchase the full PDF or a printed copy of this issue.
Continue ReadingEd Note 30.05/06
Greetings to our Beat Within readers and writers near and far. We’re grateful to have you with us, and we’re honored to be part of your journey. The writing we encounter on a daily basis at The Beat challenges us to think critically and dream big, and we celebrate your thoughts, experiences, and opinions in each and every magazine. For this issue, we’re welcoming back Michael Kroll, AKA Einstein, to our editorial section. If you’ve been with us for a while, chances are you know Michael, as he’s been hosting workshops in juvenile detention facilities, community centers, and high schools
Continue ReadingNothing Wrong with Difference
-David, Sonoma I’ve always been different from all of my classmates or my peers. I’ve been called different for a lot of things, whether it was because of my childhood or the things I do or how I do them, and even what I’ve been through. The way I talk is a big one. I have been around a lot of “hoodlums” and I talk a lot of slag. I talk a little bit different, as people have told me a few times. I’ve had a lot of traumas as a young minority. Hung around different people my whole life,
Continue ReadingI’m Still Here
-JP, Albuquerque I will never forget how to choose loved ones over someone you’ve fallen in love with. It was April fifteenth, 2023, when I had fallen madly in love with this one boy. It felt like a dream come true, it was only a slight talk on the dance floor before he asked to dance. I felt like a princess, and how he called me “beautiful like the night sky.” He was always complimenting me until one cold night we were out, took a couple of drinks, and like the wise say, “drunk words are sober thoughts.” Oh my,
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