Happy New Year friends and lovers of The Beat Within! What an honor to have this publication in your hands to read and absorb, with the hope that the following words give you that shot in the arm of inspiration and support. Publishing a print magazine in this day and time – a website, emails blasts/newsletter, social media, and let us not forget the many writing and conversation workshops we lead each week inside various juvenile halls, schools, community based organizations, the San Francisco County Jail and inside San Quentin State Prison… well, it’s a lot of work, but truly
Continue ReadingTo The Beat Within Community
by Ricky Sevier I take great joy and pleasure writing to The Beat Within as I flashback to the early 2000’s San Mateo County Hillcrest Juvenile Hall 21 Tower Road, before the new one was built. I was just starting to write and The Beat Within motivated me, reading poems and stories from other youth and all the way in the back the last few pages were always from people incarcerated in the state pen (adult system), telling powerful and thoughtful stories and poems on another level. Now, I find myself in Lancaster California State Prison. A friend of mine
Continue ReadingDear Roses Coming Up Out The Concrete
by Missy Hart aka Infinite Mentality I want to first and foremost open this letter with my utmost love and respect. I hope this letter finds you in high spirits, if not, I hope this letter lifts them a bit. Beautiful roses, seeds planted in the garden of grief, I feel your pain, I feel your loss, I feel your struggle, a life many cannot relate to, but I’m taking this time to put you up on game of what is waiting for you outside them walls if you strive towards it. A life worth living is waiting for you
Continue ReadingEd Note 24.01/02
Welcome friends to another amazing issue of writing and art from the inside. Happy 2019! For our first double issue of the year, we’re pleased to present you two more reflections from our wonderful interns at Urban School of San Francisco, where students have been transcribing pieces for The Beat Without. Below you’ll find a passionate essay written by Lizzie, where she explores how hate isolates people from each other, and how The Beat Within works against hate by connecting people with radically different experiences and perceptions. We’re also featuring Sunil, who writes an empowering and motivation letter to his past self, inspired by a piece that he transcribed by one of our longtime Beat Without writers, Vernon Smith. We’re deeply humbled to be able to provide this bridge between our writers on the inside and writers on the outside. Thank you for your excellent work, Lizzie and Sunil!
Continue ReadingVolume 24.01/02
Please contact Lisa Lavaysse if you would like to purchase the full PDF or a printed copy of this issue.
Continue ReadingTransformation of A Murderer
Ten years in prison. I was housed at Pelican Bay State Prison (in Crescent City, CA). The institution was on lockdown. I was called to see the Chaplin on Monday, June 9, 2008. The Chaplin told me that my baby brother, Edward was shot and killed. I felt as if a lightning bolt struck my body as I fell after hearing this news. I called my baby sister, Tasha and listened to her describe the circumstances of our brother’s death. My eyes watered because I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
I went back to my cell, told my cellie what I just found out and when we come off this lockdown, I’m out of here. I called out to the tower officer and asked if I could call my family. Him knowing the situation, allowed me to use the phone. After talking to my mother and other siblings. I asked the tower officer if I could go on the concrete yard to be alone for a while. He did so.
Continue ReadingIt Should Come To A Stop
Dear The Beat Within,
My name is Carl. I’m from Richmond, CA and I’m just writing you guys to say thank you for what you’re doing. I like that you guys go to different juvenile halls and county jails to speak to kids and adults like me and others that want to change.
I also wrote you to say whoever wrote the editor’s note is 100% true, and young people know what he is trying to say.
I think there will be change in the world. For example, this rap shhh gets in a lot of young people’s heads. They talk about drugs, sex, killing, dead ones, and stuff like that. I think if there was more people talking out in meetings and stuff that would change street violence, gang violence, killings that’re going on in the world, and it should come to a stop.
Continue ReadingVolume 23.51/24.01
Please contact Lisa Lavaysse if you would like to purchase the full PDF or a printed copy of this issue.
Continue ReadingEd Note 23.51/24.01
Welcome to our year-end double issue, 23.51/24.01. What a year we have had! Thank you all for making The Beat Within the success that it is. We could not do it without you all. As for this issue, there is so much good writing that awaits you readers, we are grateful you stopped by this latest editorial note. As some of you know, we have an amazing partnership with the students at the Urban School of San Francisco. Throughout the school year (for some even during the summer) our high school interns are hard at work transcribing pieces of The Beat Without and supporting our community workshops. Here we’re featuring the reflections of two of our interns, Tara and Sally, who both provide insight into their experiences. In Tara’s piece, the pieces of The Beat Without are like a portal in her hands, fostering a sense of connection to an individual she’ll never know face-to-face. In Sally’s essay, The Beat has given her a chance to see incarcerated folks as individuals, rather than a group solely defined by their common circumstance. We’re so grateful for our partnership with the Urban School, and to be able to work with young people on the outs to challenge perceptions of incarceration. Stay tuned for more of our interns’ reflections! Enjoy the following!
Continue ReadingThe Demise That Opened My Eyes
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world,” said Nelson Mandela (1918-2013). The word ‘Education’ is derived from the Latin word ‘Educere,’ which means: “to rear, to lead forth.”
In other words, it is something used to move and propel one forward. With this in mind, one might ask his or her self the question: What is it that leads me forward today? What drives me to think, act, and respond the way I do?
As a young kid growing up on the streets of East San Jose, I never really asked myself this question, nor did I take education seriously. Honestly, as long as I was good at being a criminal, who needed education? I could make hundreds of dollars a week living a life of crime, and I didn’t need a degree for that. So, looking back, being a thug is what motivated me. That’s what propelled me.
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