Category: The Beat Without

by Q When I look in the mirror I see this young girl that’s hurt deep down inside, Lost and confused, hurt and abused, don’t know what to do, trying to gure out my next best move. Addicted to the streets ‘cause I’m always on my feet. Ran away as a child because my young life was wild. Beaten and mistreated, still don’t know a reason. Wondering why I always get high to forget my problems. It’s just some hard shhh to swallow, nobody was there to listen so I stayed missing. Missing in action became a habit. Starting boostin’

by Harry C. Goodall I do believe that life is a puzzle. That no matter how many books you read on its improvement, life is always a constant work in progress. I’ve been trying to put the pieces of the puzzle to my life together for the past eighteen years. It’s sad to be currently forty-three years old and can only account for the last eighteen of those years being spent putting my life together. Adding pieces to your life is about rst, the realization that pieces are missing. You can’t do this if you still have an ego bigger

by Michael Arreygue All of us during our lives as children, adolescents and eventually adults need some encouragement. As the individuals we are we tend to learn differently, have different perspectives and take risks on different levels. For those like myself words of encouragement were really needed in my life to ful ll my true potential in the activities that I engaged in. Always being in juvenile hall and camps as a kid I did receive a lot of encouragement to break out of my shell and try to think differently. It took a long time for me to grow,

by Harry C. Goodall I’ll never forget the rst time I saw my daughter. I knew her mother was pregnant but never knew whether she actually had the baby or not. It was a woman I met while selling drugs in another state. I was told that she left Washington and moved to Kansas. That was the end of what I knew about the pregnancy. My stay in that state ended with me coming back to California and getting a parole violation and another year in a California prison. The next time I heard of her was when my friend

by Dortell Williams If you’re anything like me, you’ve made some mistakes and even bad decisions. I am a man of many regrets, but someone once told me that it isn’t where you’ve been, but where you are going that counts. It’s true. No matter what we done in the past, as regrettable as it may be, we are like books – waiting for that next chapter to be written. The great thing is that we are the authors of our own books. What is said in each chapter is up to us. One decision at a time each its

by Keith Erickson The scars of my childhood are the very parts of me that so many men like me, incarcerated men, want to keep locked away from the rest of the world around them. The Alternatives to Violence Project Workshops bring out the courage in men that you would never expect to witness within a prison. This weekend was like a whirlwind of emotions and laughter that left many of us crying, yet with the realization that our personal af ictions are so much bigger than just ourselves—they also belong to so many others within and outside of these

by  Michael X. Bell A lot of people often ask and wonder “How does a person manage to survive (mentally or physically) after spending nearly two decades of their life in prison? And what is to become of someone who gets incarcerated at age of fourteen and is sentenced to spend the rest of their entire life locked away in prison?” I ask, rather the conviction was just or not, how can such a cruel and unusual punishment tactic as giving kids life sentences in adult prisons, be allowable under the code of law?” And then there are those who

by Vernon Smith  Greetings and peace and blessings upon each of every one of you that listen to this beat of ours… I want to share with you all some of my own “calls for help”– the first two relate to each other and a little bit more of what I’m going through now within my own journey. And the third one will be a shout-out and a cry-out for help from all of you, as you will see… Alright now on my last prison term, which I ended up doing in ASP/Avenal from 2008-2012 I landed on the B-yard

by Phillip Kelly In my opinion, a safe community consists of positive, happy, genuine people, plenty of resources; i.e., money for after school programs, new supplies every quarter like books, pencils, paper, whatever is needed or used mostly by the kids, clean streets and public spaces, no graf ti, homeless people, prostitution, and drug users. I would say a place like Beverly Hills is very safe; mainly from the many white superstars that live there with plenty of money; a vigilant police force and other members of that community who care and take pride in how the community functions and

by Gigg’s No one said life was fair. I don’t agree with life’s experiences some people and I have shared… Who knew she wouldn’t believe me when I told her he rubbed on me. Streaks from the streams of my eyes, and she tellin’ me, “there ain’t no reason for them fears…” Later on, taking life in my own hands and it’s for his life he came to fear… Who knew he’d step up and start beating me when dude walked away and left his seeds. I would cringe for no reason, not knowing him and him would be the reasons