Persisting to Love

A dulled light of day was shining into our bedroom, matching the sullen mood, enhanced by caresses, with a heavy mixture of love and pain. Car alarms rang off rhythm to the sad bachata blasting from someone’s car stereo. Our bed sat by the half open window, at level with the sill, and as I laid belly down with child, sprawled over his body, I could see the littered concrete dotted with idle, middle aged Dominican men singing along, and round bodied brown mothers, grocery bags and children in hand, walking to the slow, constant beat of despair. I became aware of the miracle we were – imperfect but persistently, striving to become ourselves, striving to know love. Baldwin states, “Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.” Loving can be a painful process. These masks exist as a defense or shield from environments of terror and numbness. We mistake false identities for ourselves. Removing masks would make us susceptible to become vulnerable to these fatal environments, and so we sleep and wake and bathe with our masks on and forget there was once a bright face looking back in the mirror at the innocence of our early youth, however long that might have lasted – for some, 10 years, for others, possibly 3. We become a colony of preconstructed characters, blind to the concept of a community consisting of honest individuals. The fear of removing these masks contribute further to the poison latent in our fatal environments.
In today's time, loving can be a painful process because loving means we come to accept that the world does affect us; that the constant grilling, the sight of children being frisked by authorities, the smell of piss on every wall of each abandoned building we walk by, the idleness of life or the moral ease of those who end it, their own or others', all have the ability to make us weep and become filled with true anguish, or loose our minds completely. But without coming to accept and understand this, we would have no incentive to want to exist in a different kind of world, or exist at all. And if we cannot exist as ourselves, outside of these masks, in our environments then we are left with two options – to change our environments or run away from it, and the spaces where oppression does not exist at some level are becoming endangered, quickly. Part of our attempt to change society must be to develop ourselves and offer the people we were meant to be to each other..
We laid there, two lovers, both tainted by the terror of this world, trying to understand the answer to this question – how can love become an oasis where realizing our highest selves will not be compromised? This, for us is a new concept, for we both come from histories where loving has taken us through moments of deceit, anguish, and pain, often times by attempting to love others who have not had the courage to notice, no less, remove their own masks. Yet still, we laid in our humble bedroom – a paradox, hope fighting to exist among week-old laundry thrown in corners, each clothing piece a removal of some weight picked up by our interaction with the shaken world, the walls scented of day old incense burned to center ourselves within what parts of ourselves we’ve come to know, mixed with whiffs of spiced meats and fried platanos carried by the cool draft of a new autumn in that old fifth floor apartment where our lives as a new family is to begin. I imagine we were both at some point in our internal conversations, wondering how this miracle is supposed to unfold with a lack of known references of liberated love. A dear friend once asked me, “Is it possible to imagine or know freedom if our legacies have never truly experienced it within the last 500 years of oppression?” What must it be like to live with no masks, and love with no limits? We can try to imagine what this oasis might look like, but even our imaginations are tainted with the pain that has held our true identities hostage. We try to caress and kiss away the false illusions we’ve acquired over time, but we cannot pretend that the world does not enter our attempts to love.
One night I was under the false illusion that my body was dirty and worthless. It was difficult to be held and for parts of my body to become exposed outside of our bed sheets.. That day, a young boy had violated my right to have my body protected from unwanted touch or exposure. He was no older than 12, with the face of a terrified child. The world had put in his mind that it was okay to violate women to his own pleasing or for his own curiosities. It was probably the first time he had tried to pull down a woman’s shirt, for his body language and his eyes were so full of fear of his own actions. His environment had placed the mask of “sexual assailant” on such a young face. His toxic environment had shaped the emotional state of my body. A hot shower could not wash away the filth and anguish that sat like silt upon my pregnant belly, naked breasts, and reoccurring memory. All throughout that night, whenever I became aware of my body, it only existed within those short moments of feeling violated and humiliated.
Being a woman of color who has cracked her mask in this world makes one become even more deeply connected to the pain that exists in these war zones. We become exposed to the efforts of a white world trying to erase our existence, but we also become exposed to a dystopic patriarchal society – even among our brothers of color – that also seek to null our true power and beauty, either because they do not understand it or are intimidated by it (therefore the need to control or undermine it). The product of males of color feeling powerless in a white society is the sexually violated woman of color. When boys and men of color are given no spaces with which to experience or understand authentic power, they take up the white man’s illusion of power – to conquer and control- and turn it on their own women (and in other ways, on each other). This results in communities of masks laden with false power and bodies with limited abilities to feel love and security, communities of unknown or lost identities.
The perseverance of love between my lover and I, consists of a lifetime series of attempts to know ourselves, discover true power, and share our unfolding selves with each other. One element of our love is essential if it is to survive in a world where freedom is an alien concept, and that is – our love must have the ability to overcome oppression – oppression embedded within ourselves, oppression perpetuated in society. We are left with no tools but our own developing imaginations and the courage to take on this challenge, and courage is essential if we are to walk and love and speak without masks. It takes an enormous amount of trust amongst ourselves to take on this task. We are still in the process of fully understanding and realizing love, although our imperfect attempts are miracles because against the weighty odds, we persistently choose to exist, to find our highest selves within ourselves and between each other, to love, in the context of deliberate numbness and inadvertent hate.

Red Wine

A flash fiction story I had written a while ago and just remembered as I was grading my students' short stories. Sure this piece still calls for serious improvement, but I think it's worth sharing anyway...

How much time does it take to get from point A to point B? She was in disbelief. It just didn’t feel like point B. This is not what she had imagined. There were supposed to be fireworks, popping champagne bottles, people-filled rooms and festivities. But there were no voices speaking. The fading light bulb lit up an empty living room. Each day, the walk into the kitchen, the setting of keys on the table, made the yellowing walls come over her. Daily experiences were drab like the tablecloths that folded onto her lap as she had her lone celebratory dinner.


Finally the world had caught up. The Chinese take-out sat opened and yet to be served on the one, empty plate, placed at the single candle-lit table. Always the one too busy for opening movie nights, birthday parties, or dinners with the girls. The wine. Nobody else chilled their dry red wine. She did. Remembering where she placed it, she grabbed it feeling almost accompanied by it. Stabbing the top of its mouth, each rough and slow unscrew became a step closer to herself. It’s alright, she doesn’t need recognition. It has always been about the work, or rather, the purpose of the work. It was never about who noticed. It was more about it getting done. Getting it done meant the work would speak for itself.


After popping the cork, the cool smoky air rose from the bottle as it angled over the glass. A nice slow gulp with eyes closed. Exhale. Eyes open. Suddenly that meal became the festive occasion it was meant to be. She heaped her plate with vegetable fried rice, sechzuan eggplant, and spicy bean curd, and dug in.


The work should speak to her kin. If they only cared to listen. But perhaps the work just speaks a different language. It was a book. Not everyone speaks “book.” Her chewing slowed. The glass of wine was half-empty. Most of her closest loved ones didn’t speak it. How did it come to this? Who was she? What was point A? This eggplant sure tastes good. How long has she been here?


Another gulp of the chilled red wine. The glass rested between her slender fingers. She would see her mom picking it up and reading her name on the cover, proud and filled with joy. But what good is it if she won’t crack the book open, or try the first few lines and then let it sit, like a trophy, next to pictures of loved ones both alive and in the spirit world? Her brother would ask her for the title, call it “interesting,” and congratulate her, moving on to the next mundane topic. He wouldn’t even ask her for a copy, one she had already signed for him. “Con Amor, Juana.” Then there were the childhood friends. They called her “the scholar.” But she’d like to see herself as more like them than they allowed her to. In fact, the “scholars” that would read and recognize her work would consider it authentic, or in “non-book talk,” ghetto.

The grip around the long cool bottle tipped its mouth over the wine glass. The window. She leaned at the edge of its pane. The sun moved quickly towards the horizon. On the sidewalk was her past sprawled out before her eyes. Pedestrians would intrude onto children’s hopscotch and scooter chasing games. Dads would slam domino pieces over crate balanced wood boards, while moms would huddle into groups and share the latest, occasionally screaming at children that moved too close to traffic. She looked back at her half eaten dinner spread on the single chaired table. Where had point B gone?

Broken Body Lyrics - Tigera Consciente

I wrote this today on the train ride home after looking for an apartment for my mom outside of NYC to get her out of a battered women's shelter, after a break up with someone I love and care about, after two straight weeks of my first year as a full time maestra, after having just moved back home to NYC and in Wash Heights, after 7 years of metamorphosis...

Broken Body by Tigera Consciente (Beats by Beatnuts, feat. Dead Prez)

My stomach turned and produced anxiety
running up my esophagus into my heart
connected to some long distant artery,
an umbilical cord running into yours.
My thoughts,
mingled with your uncensored emotion,
exploding into my eyes, I cannot see
past where I've been and who I am
when it was you and me.
How can I profess this to be or not to be,
life has me questioning, asking, pleading,
crying, breaking,
tearing out of this enclosed space I call safety,
only to build a new one I like to call clarity,
but the membranes are too thick for me to see through,
feel through, stuffy inside I cannot breathe truth,
I must bust open and fly out into uncertainty,
ask a million questions why-
why am I me, and who am I to be,
in this, in us, alone,
stripped down
beneath the bone marrow my spirit sticks to
the earthly matter it is repelled to.
Stationing itself in perpetual complacency
or is it latency, dormancy,
does it not know what its capable of,
or are my bones unable to soothe
the aching screams of a speaking spirit?

What do they not want to hear?

Do they not want to carry the image of its destruction?

Who am I to be? What do I fear?
I run with the soles of my feet
numbed and calloused,
no longer feeling the lost breath,
the running heartbeat,
a race to death with a faint vision of life,
because all I can see is the concrete in front of me,
sun up and sun down,
hoping one day I would reach myself,
not knowing I might be carrying the object of my wealth
behind my eyes,
open and closed,
sometimes
catching a glimpse of life, sometimes
of its distorted reflection.
10 years,
15 years,
20 years later
my knees collapse,
shattered bones within tightened skin
sprawled across the pavement.
Perhaps that day I will feel the light speed
of my spirit,
light years behind my thoughts
yet over the finished line.
Perhaps then I would see
truth waiting for my arms to crawl
this broken body
back home.

Forbidden Dream #2

I saw you come up towards me
I, smirking
You, curious
Wanting to know what you
Wanted to find out

I had a secret

You
Full of repressed joy
Took my receptive
Body
Picked up your exhilarated thoughts
Sat me down onto some bed
Inside some strangely familiar room

What's the secret?

Oh,
Its not what you were hoping

Notwithstanding
You took me into your bold arms
Choosing the forbidden
Fuck the conventions
Attempting to
Steal a kiss

I was still
Taken aback
My teeth lock-jawed
Over your finger
Over the moment

What came of your desire
That now became mine?

A common
Forbidden
Desire

12/4 2am EST

Staceyann Chin- The One Who Started the Fire

This miraculous woman, was the first model I had that exemplified the powerful ability of queer, women of color to move audiences. She was a guest in my English class in high school back in '99 (I think) and I walked in late not knowing that day I was going to finally learn something about myself, something relative.

She was uncensored, raw, full of fire, and redefined sexy... seriously- at least for me as a high school student in those days. I followed her to the final slam at the Nuyorican Poet's Cafe, and even though she had lost to Kirk Nugent, she captivated my spirit. For those of you who had been to the Nuyorican, you know how small the space is- the place was packed and spilling over with bodies squatting on floors, filling up stair cases, after having paid their 10 bucks with no complaints- they were there for the holy ghost subsumed in these poets' words. This was the first day of the rest of my life.

Afterwards, my writing become charged and took on a more sophisticated character, knowing then I wanted to write for others to be validated by my words, and in turn validating my own humanity. I joined a spoken word workshop with Youth Speaks, and this helped me begin the process of developing my voice, not just in poetry but everywhere else in my life as well.

But when the spirit came down... damn. It was my first performance at the Nuyorican. I was furious that day. That day I had deeply upset my mother on her birthday- and I was raging, fumin'! I was conflicted as to whether to allow her to come witness this side of me she hadn't known. I was scared, either I'd fuck up and she'd think "oh how cute" or I'd do a great job and she'd judge or misunderstand me and the whole performance aspect. So I left her, and that fed the fire. I only brought my little sister with me. Throughout the whole train ride from Harlem down to the Lower East Side, my thoughts kept kindling the fire. When I got up on stage I was a dragon with fire blowing out of me, and everyone I looked at was connected, people were nodding their heads, yelling out "Yes!", shouting- they were right here with me, almost inside me, burning in the flames. It was my first standing ovation. I had finally come to myself.

Running Away From Ignorance

“Why would you be scared?” She asked. “Well I'm not sure exactly how I am going to feel. It’s a list of unrelated things.” I haven’t been used to having someone to really talk to about what I was going through within myself. I couldn’t find the words, and I realized that for a while, I began to feel that there were no words to describe what I was going through. But could I really understand it if I couldn’t describe it in words? “I don’t know if I’ll feel like I had lost something. Made a bad move. That's one thing I’m scared to realize.” She kept looking at me, as if she could see the experience, my life, being haphazardly juxtapositioned into words. I didn’t have to describe that the words didn’t quite fit. Even she knew how defeating the English language could be. “But then, I’m also scared that I'll come here and realize that I have moved on; that I completed my mission in this place, and that I had made the right choice to leave.” I was starting to feel like the words and my thoughts were coming into some type of compromise to put the message across. I relied more on the fact that I knew she’d understand, even with few words. She had known me well enough, I remembered. “This place. This moment in my life… I don’t want to loose it. But I also don’t want to feel stagnated. I want to progress.” Her face expressed a complete understanding, “It sounds like you need to rebuild the courage to grow in a new type of environment. You’ve been used to having us around to guide you and support you through your challenges, and so that’s the part of this you don’t want to let go of. But it also looks like you want to accept that challenge of surviving a new jungle. Unknown territory. You’ve always been a fighter, and it seems like that’s just how your identity continues to shift into defining who you are.” There’s something about this place that’s magical, and she’s just a piece of a larger world. “Look, try to think back to your first days moving here.” I was a totally different person then, I thought. I don’t know if I could really fit my old shoes that easily. “There were things you weren’t expecting that happened, that turned you into who you are today. You’ve been through some fucked up shit out here, but that shit made you a tougher person and a wiser woman. I know you’ve made the right choice, and whatever you had within yourself that allowed you to survive this place, you still have in you today. I know its not the same as it is out here, the same kind of support, but you’ll start to shift in your thinking, and realize what it is you have to do out there. The spirits are always with you, watching.” Somehow I already knew all this, but there’s something about putting words to it, as inadequate as they may be, that somehow makes the feeling tangible, like a weapon. “You’re right. So I guess I really came back to figure out what kinds of changes I’m going to have to adapt to. I need to clarify some things. Take an inventory of things I’ll leave in this old closet by these old shoes, and try to prepare myself for what I'll grow into in this new place. It’s still painful to think about it this way, though. I love this place so much. Never have I grown to know so much about myself and the world, in such little time. Six years. It sounds like a long time, but its really not.”

She looked at me, noticing I’m still feeling unresolved. “What?” “Its…its just that, six years ago, I wanted to leave home. There was nothing there for me but the redundancy of misery. I was okay about leaving. But now… now I feel like I’m leaving something good… something beautiful. But I guess there’s still… there’s still that need for growth. I think placing myself in a new context will get me where I need to be. There’s something telling me that I need to be challenged in a different way… to realize something I don’t know, something I have yet to know that I will know… you know what I mean?” We both laughed at the awkwardness of my wording. “Yea, I know.” Suddenly I had just remembered that this knowledge of the existence of an unknown was what brought me here. I wasn’t just running away from misery. I was running away from ignorance.

Women of Color Surviving Sexual Violence

Check out In Solidarity posted by BFP, who's focusing on sexual assault survivors.. There are a couple of interesting ideas for validating the experiences of sexual assault. I particularly like this idea of a 24 hour blog vigil.

Also I am putting together a compilation of pieces by WOC artists/writers who have survived sexual violence and outright systematic oppression as women of color:

Attention women of color writers and artists:
This is a call for submissions for an anthology of very original and compelling short stories (fiction and non-fiction), testimonies, poetry, plays, photographs, and artwork! The theme of this anthology, titled Quiet Wars, will be about women of color's experiences in being faced with and surviving systemic oppression through interpersonal experiences. How has sexism, racism, classism, homophobia, ableism, ageism, nativism, etc., experienced through interpersonal relations violated women of color? Do you have a story on experiences dealing with rape, domestic violence, hate violence, or being humiliated/marginalized physically/intellectually/culturally in social settings (job, school, family, etc.) as a woman of color? How have you/do you (or generally women of color) survived these experiences? How are women of color pressured to not speak about these experiences? What does healing around these issues look like? Is healing something hard to conceptualize?

Submissions need not be actual testimonials although these are definitely more than welcome. As long as they creatively and compellingly engage and explore the theme they are welcome. The idea for this anthology came about through the (very personal) realization of empowerment and initial healing through naming and talking about our experiences. The goal of this project is to create an awareness of the issues specific to women of color against power imbalances (within our own communities of color as well as within the larger dominant society). This awareness also allows for the validation of other women's experiences who have gone through similar encounters with power. It will be a conversation with the many "faceless" women who come into contact with power and have difficulty naming their experiences.

Deadline for submissions will be June 17th note the date change. Email me at: "RosaDominicana at gmail dot com" with submissions or questions.
Please forward this selectively to other women of color writers/artists!

QUIET WARS

To whom it does concern:

You have a certain way of doing it. It began with the identical set of questions you had asked other women, students, about their personal lives. One woman who spoke didn’t let it get past the questions. I was in a slightly different position. The people I trust, the people who had changed my life have close relationships with you. I was familiar with your work in the community and had personal relationships with those who collaborated with you or worked under you. Students were ready to risk their university degrees for your cause, because they believed you were deep in the struggle. I was caught up in the fabricated glory of you. So I answered your questions without a second thought, and asked some myself, not knowing yet where this was going but not feeling threatened at all.

Each night, once a week on the same weekday after class you’d come upstairs and into my door or we’d go out to dinner, and the plan was to go over some work. This only happened two or three times. Other nights were continuations of the questioning with drawn out conversation. Flirting. You asked me about my general intentions. I told you I wanted nothing short of commitment. I was moving into a new cycle in my life, where I wanted to be patient with the next person. To wait a while. You said you were glad I was 25 at the time. That I had a certain maturity and certainty about my path. There was a clarity that developed through the late night conversations and the short moments of physical closeness.

There was that first night. Before a trip to some academic conference you were flying out to. We agreed it was cool for you to spend the night, so we could continue our talks. The late night came and went, and then came tiredness long past midnight. You told me to bring an extra pillow. I figured there wasn’t any harm. I reminded myself that there was a given mutual trust and respect.

Your hands. They caught me by surprise- attempting to find their ways into places I was not yet ready to give. I wanted to be held. But I was not asking for more than this. I pushed your hands away- several times. Eventually you stopped, turned around, and fell asleep facing the wall.

It was that second night. We studied at your house. The place that you were so thrilled to show me. This was yours. Your accomplishment. Your big privilege. Not mine. At times you would say we were privileged, that we could do whatever we wanted. Clearly you misunderstood who I was, and you were immersed in your acquisitions. There was an obsession about you. Always wanting to get published. To out-publish this person or that institution. Naïvely so, I got caught up in the glory of this world I confused for my own. I slipped outside myself to become enraptured with the idea of co-publishing with you. Of thinking that this was going to become part of what was going to define me. This was your way of doing things. It was not long before I discovered that your vision was never to incorporate my valuable thoughts into what was to be your accomplishment. Your big privilege. To have someone run around and look things up for you. Your academic maid. Xerox copies. Research. I was too busy for this. I had to defend my time. And even that night I couldn’t finish my own work, because yours needed feedback, processing, analysis, refinement. When I said I had work of my own to do, I caught you stopping yourself before you said my work was insignificant in light of yours. Blinded by the glory, I doubted that this was what I heard. But I look back into the image of that time, and that's exactly what was said.

Still, that second night you had your way of doing things. Between the work, there was the continuing conversation over tea. You said this could work. This secret affair. Someone would have to make compromises when it came time for me to make the decision to move back home, but we should try it. See if it’s worth it. See what comes out of it. You were seriously into me. You were feeling me. You were feeling this. You said this. And I reiterated what my intentions have been. I was not a fling. I was looking for the real thing and you responded saying you were looking for the same. I believed you. Caught up in the glory of it all. That second night continued. The drowsiness came in, but we were caught up in your bedroom. I was not so reluctant as the first night. I had your words with me. Still, it wasn’t easy. There was kissing and stopping. Touching and blocking. Reaching, and grabbing, and pushing away. Thinking. I had your words with me. Your words that so many had relied on for validation. Your words that were inquired into by academic experts supposedly in the struggle. Your words that have compelled others to question, think, and reason in new ways. Your words made it okay. They were worth something. They were worth all the faith I had in the work you do and the people who have worked with you. And so it happened your way. I took you for your words. This was your big accomplishment. Your big privilege. Your words have given you all the access. Power. Money. Sex. Reputation. Status. This was your way of doing things. And then came morning and the rest of the day as it usually comes to me. Work. School. Home. Sleep. The quiet war had started, yet I still didn’t know.

The next morning you had made your decision. You picked me up from my books and took me out to breakfast. Crepes, coffee, and home fried potatoes. This was your way of doing things. You said we couldn’t do it anymore. It was too risky. You could loose your place in the game. Your accomplishments. Your big privileges. The cause that you had everyone else so worked up for. We could just be friends. That morning you tried to dishonor the names of those who have been loyal to you, loyal to the struggle. You projected yourself onto them: saying that they’re caught up in their own privileges, that they’re not consistent with their words, that they don’t “ride” for you. We could still work together, you said. I looked at you. I had no words. You tried to draw them out of me, but I had not yet formulated cogent thoughts. I only knew I felt defeated. Back-stabbed. Used. You wanted me to be okay. Okay with this. Your decision.

The next week I had taken myself out of the glory of you and your world. I had slipped back into myself, finding myself angry at having abandoned my self. I looked at what had come over me. Recited your words in my memory. Replayed every action. Remembered every response you had for every word I said between us. Re/dis/covered your way with things. I called you. Texted you. There were no longer the prompt responses. I had some thoughts I wanted to share. You were too busy now. It was important, the words you tried to draw out of me- I found them. You called me from the doctor’s office, in a hurry. But, my words needed time. Respect. Space. Serious consideration. I was about to tell you something about yourself you couldn't see. Or so I thought. Something that called for reflection. Change.

Months went by with no replies. Days came and went with the usual school and work business, but now with this quiet war in my mind that I tried to ignore. Until a woman came up. She had her war too, and she had it with you. She was a random woman I didn't know who had spoken. I listened. I decided to speak too. Through this act of self-love, of speaking, of naming, I learned from other women who knew you closely, that this quiet war wasn’t just about me. There were a list of women who had their quiet wars with you too. I was enraged. Disgusted. Feeling more defeated than the morning you had made your decision. This was a way you had with other women too. It was systematic. I had been a bent up cog in your machine used to fabricate the false power you exude. My existence, my QUEENDOM had been diminished to that. And there was the struggle: a chariot used to carry you across the world with women of color for horses. I saw things now as they had been before me, as they continue to be for other women who fight these quiet wars. I spoke. Made it known. Swept the pile of dust from under the rug and into the wind of the world you share with your closest ones. The ones who validate you. The ones who should challenge you and your way with things.

This letter is not for you. This letter is for all the other women who fight these quiet wars. Every time I must face other students, other women, caught up in the glory, speaking about how great your lectures are, how innovative your academic articles are, how great it must have been to study with you, independently, I fight that quiet war. For every word I do not speak in these instances, my existence dissipates into the abyss hidden beneath the disillusionment of academic glory. I wish I could tell the world about what you do after your reputation is done doing its flaunting for the day in the ivory towers. How your integrity should be called into question. How that detailed letter you wrote to the colleges for me was not about me, but a copy and paste unfounded story about a different student. I bet you thought I wouldn't speak. How long would you think this game would play for? How long before you'd mess with the wrong QUEEN? But I know there is no design in place for healing and accountability. There is only punishment. And within revenge exists no change. No transformation for a colonized man of color in a white colonial system. No healing for the women of color who fight these quiet wars. I’m not interested in apologies. I won’t answer to any phone calls, letters, or emails about your excuses for the truth. I was there. The other women were there. Your character has already been determined by your actions. The conversation you must have is not with me or the other women you have dishonored. The conversation you must have is with yourself.

Sincerely,
Rosa Cabrera

P.S.
From the 5 Mindfulness Trainings you say you observe, the one you will not post on your big windows and walls:
The Third Training: Aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct, I vow to cultivate responsibility and learn ways to protect the safety and integrity of individuals, couples, families and society. I am determined not to engage in sexual relations without love and a long-term commitment. To preserve the happiness of myself and others, I am determined to respect my commitments and the commitments of others. I will do everything in my power to protect children from sexual abuse and to prevent couples and families from being broken by sexual misconduct.


(This is a first draft of a work in progress. Constructive criticism welcomed!)

Letter to EOC and Avenues Project Leaders

Dear East Oakland Community and Avenues Project,

When I was about 5 or 6 years old, I used to look down at my feet and notice how near they seemed to my reach. I was well aware that in time that would change, and that with this change will come a number of phases and events in my life. I always tried to imagine in my head, as if looking back into a memory, what those events would look like and how I will respond to and become shaped by the challenges I would face. I knew at an earlier age that life was going to be hard, and that the choices I would make in my life would not be for my own selfish benefit. Today I look down at my size 9 feet, 5 foot 5 inches below, and look back at the years I’ve survived and how I’ve lived my life. As I break myself open, I count the rings and marks like a severed tree trunk, remembering the moments that have challenged and strengthened me throughout my life.

I’ve survived growing up in a home of unchallenged domestic violence, I’ve survived teaching for years in New York with no guidance and no support, I’ve survived cleaning bathrooms, floors, and windows in the San Francisco SOMA district in exchange for rent at a hostel after leaving my family and a crying mother in New York City at merely 20 years old, I’ve survived a physically abusive lover for two years, I’ve survived three universities through sacrificing having a life to keep up a damn 3.7 GPA, I’ve survived being sexually manipulated by a naïvely trusted professor and a high regarded community member, I’ve survived being a queer woman of color in a straight white man’s world. While all of these experiences have helped me, in harsh ways, to gain some of the strength and wisdom I need to stay unafraid to walk towards freedom, no event in my life has challenged me more, emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually, than East Oakland Community High School and the Avenues Project.

The opportunity came about in a way that felt unmistakably predestined along the proper path in my life. I went to a conference in Oakland on education and immigrant rights to meet Luis Garden Acosta of the Young Lords Party, and was drawn to Cesar Cruz and the Richmond Making Changes Freedom School instead. I knew right away that I wanted to see the dream I had been in the process of imagining when I learned about the grassroots movement taking place on a family’s backyard in Richmond. It was a necessary and fulfilling sacrifice to take the Bart twice a week from San Francisco to Richmond to learn what it meant to participate in creating my own freedom. Cesar then told me about a job offer he had in Oakland, and asked me about 4 or 5 times to come join him and teach during the school day and after school. I was an overtime student at San Francisco State and I didn’t think I’d be able to carry the weight. I’m glad though, that Cesar didn’t let me say no. I didn’t know at the time that this was the school that Jeff Duncan-Andrade, the professor I had admired for his dedication and expertise in urban education, had been talking about teaching in himself. I also didn’t know, that I would come across a number of community members that I would hold in high regard for the rest of my life. A lot of things seemed to have fallen into their places for a significant reason.

EOC/ Avenues has been the only place that has challenged me to the utmost depth thus far. It was the only place that had allowed me to push harder than ever to give birth to visions for curriculum structure, putting theory into practice, and become myself: an educator who uses text as AK47’s against the intellectual apartheid of this oppressive society. For years I had dreamed of building a space for young soldiers of color to grow intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally, and here I found that someone was dreaming the same dream, and there I was participating in it. I was dead scared. What if I would face a challenge I could not overcome? What if I couldn’t yet give my students the education they deserve? What if I would find that I wasn’t strong enough yet to be the person I had wanted to be? EOC was the only opportunity I’ve had thus far to put my inner self to the test. It was not only the space that has helped me grow as an educator, as a leader, and as a person true to herself, but it has also taught me how to grow. For this I am grateful. I am also grateful that this movement challenges what many say is unlikely or impossible. Because of somebody else’s dream, my own dream feels like a tangible reality. I no longer feel that I would doubt myself in my ability to realize my goal. I am not only more aware and have a clearer sense of what my weaknesses are, but I’ve gained a set of tools and truths that will help me continue the process of self-transformation and building strength. EOC has truly helped me understand that it is only through facing my weaknesses that I will rediscover myself in the process of becoming.

Through EOC I’ve also come to understand how symbols of power can co-opt or stagnate a movement. Being an overtime student confuses you. It tricks you into thinking you are gaining truth, through acquiring false power. Veracious truth and power come through the conquest for freedom, and there is nothing that taught me this more than understanding what it means to conquer the oppressor through the minds of our youth. Every lesson taught with success was a battle won. It is an amazing privilege to observe the transformation I helped create within my classroom. I don’t know many people in my past who would ever think that Black and Brown students would be able to apply Frantz Fanon, Paulo Freire, Stephen Haymes, Andrea Smith, and concepts of structural violence and symbolic violence to their everyday lives, let alone visual documentation. I’ve begun to discover the power of critical art. Because of my experience in this movement, I have already proven many people I will encounter in my future wrong. The EOC movement has pushed me to take a giant leap down my chosen path.

I am not looking forward to graduate school. I face the same frustrations that my students do in transitioning into an institution usurped by systematic intellectual apartheid. I know that no university institution in that system will push me further along the path of freedom more than the community of EOC can. I’m infuriated that so-called educational institutions that perpetuate sexist, racist, and homophobic notions are allowed to exist while EOC and Avenues are being allowed to shut down. I was counting on the fact that the continuing progress that EOC and the Avenues Project make would be a testament to the survival of my own dream. But I am also furious at myself when I choose my own work at SF State over my work at EOC. And I’m enraged at the fact that I’m choosing my family and community in New York over my family and community in Oakland; that I am not choosing to stay to take a leadership role in continuing this effort. Today, I am still not sure if I am making the right choice, and I continued to think up ways to stay another year, thinking maybe I could defer grad school for a year to support the transition for EOC and Avenues. I thought up ways that I could try to convince my mom, who has been trying to flee an abusive husband, to come live in Oakland with me for a year. Still, I don’t know if this would have been the right decision to make. But it seems that for some reason(s) unknown, our leaders have chosen to conclude the dream of EOC and Avenues. This decision breaks my heart and I am truly deeply affected by it, although I feel that I am not in a place to push one decision or another, due to the fact that I’ve committed myself to be bound for New York.

Still, I am grateful to have had the privilege to be a part of this movement. This is a legacy that will, without question or doubt, continue with me back home. It has instilled in me a sense of the realities I will face in birthing my own dream. It has given me the opportunity to begin understanding the discipline needed to sustain such a dream. I have become aware of the variety of skills and support needed to nurture such a dream, and most importantly, EOC has taught me not to doubt my own ability to manifest into being visions stemming from my own conviction of freedom as a destined journey for my people. I thank the leaders and the community of EOC and Avenues for the right of passage from a naïve dreamer and visionary into a more aware and better mentally and spiritually equipped warrior for freedom. Whether it be through the “South Bronx Community High School” or the “Harlem Making Changes Freedom School” my future challenges will not have been successful without the love, wisdom, and risk that it took to build East Oakland Community High School and the Avenues Project. With all my heart and soul I thank you.

Love,
Rosa Cabrera

Buying an Adapter

I walked in and looked around, wondering if somehow I could spot him. I had no idea what he looked like. Only a faint memory of his awkward sounding voice echoed in my memory. I got in line to get something to drink to entertain my taste buds while I waited. I sat by the windows, making sure I looked a little lost and attentive, so as to make it obvious that it was me he was looking at when he saw me.
A variety of men had walked through the door, and I wondered what I looked like to them each time I made eye contact. I'd get these creepy stares from men who maybe thought I was checking them out, and then there were the looks from middle aged white men that plainly communicated, "what are you crazy!", as if I were out of my mind for trying to pick them up. I began to wonder if this is what people think of when they first meet me, see me, or as I approach people for the first time, "is she trying to get to me?" I took a gulp of my tangy orange juice and decided to stop making eye contact and tried to identify them by what they were carrying. It was supposed to be a power adapter. Could it be the Asian man with the plastic bag in his hands? I looked closer and through it I noticed the pear stems trying to push and poke through the almost see through bag. Maybe the younger white man with his backpack. I made sure this time I didn't make eye contact, but I noticed him getting his coffee and sitting down about to read something. No, he didn't seem to be looking for anyone. Hmm, the older Black man about to walk out with his suitcase? What if that was him? He had aready left and I might have missed him! I twisted the lid back on the bottle and reached into my purse for my phone. I waited to hear that awkward sounding voice again among the other messages. I found it and almost forgot how slowly he gave me the 10 digits of his phone number, making it harder for me to memorize and dial right away. I realized it was only 11:58am, and we agreed to meet at 12pm. I called him anyway. Just in case.
"Laura?" He answered right away. He had saved my number on his phone I suspect. "Yea, I'm here already, are you on your way?" "Yea, I'm within five minutes away, around the corner." "Okay, I'll be here." "Okay. What are you wearing?" It suddenly occured to me that as soon as he walked in, he would be looking at my body. This was how he was going to identify me. I'm glad it was cold outside and I was in layers. "Umm, some brown pants, a black sweater, and a blue shirt inside. I'll be sitting right next to the windows." I said, hoping he'd spot me that way before he gave attention to my physical appearance. Ok. So now I didn't have to look anymore. I made sure I finished my juice so that all I had to do was buy the thing and leave and not deal with anything else that might come with this meeting.
He took longer than five minutes. He spotted me right away with a smile and that look. I took my hand out to be polite, "Hi, I'm Laura, thanks for comming through." "Oh no problem! You didn't tell me you were so cute!" Oh god. Why. Now I really just wanted to leave, but I really needed this thing. I had a paper to type up, work to get done. Usually in these types of scenarios, I'd say something smart, sarcastic, or stupid like, "Oh I'm sorry, I forgot to tell you I was wearing my face" and then leave. But I don't have that choice right now. "Actually, I was hoping you weren't going to show up. I raised the price to eighty dollars today, but I'll honor the sixty five dollars I first posted on the ad," he said. He handed it to me and I inspected it. Making sure it didn't look busted and worn out. "They broke into my job and stole our computers so we have all this left over new stuff we don't need." It sure looked brand new. And he hadn't paid a cent for it. I had just overdrawn on my account to get rent paid for this month, and this guy was capitalizing on me. Whatever. I'm used to this kind of thing. I notice these details all the time. I reached into my wallet for the money, as he talked to me about his on the side gig of fixing up computers for gaming. It sounded like an innovative idea that took alot of work. A good hustle. Especially knowing that there are alot of heavy gamers out there these days. I wasn't one of them. Not interested. I gave him the money and he counted it. "Sixty five, right?"
I took my jacket off the back of my chair and stood up to put it on. "So, do you have a boyfriend? Are you married?" I knew it was comming. At what point in the conversation did I indicate any level of interest in him or what he does that would make me want to continue this conversation any further? Sometimes I wish I weren't so polite. People take it the wrong way almost all the time. I can almost feel it. When they try to read into your face like you couldn't possibly speak for yourself if you were interested, so your face has to do it for you. So I guess he imagined my face telling him something that wasn't real. "Actually I'm leaving California for good soon so I'm not trying to hook up with anybody. I gotta go now. That's my bike out there," I said, making sure he knows off the back that I don't need a ride anywhere. He asks anyway, "so where do you live?" "On the other side of town," I say vaguely, trying to keep it moving. "Let me walk you to your bike." Walk me to my bike? He's going to keep trying isn't he. He gets up and grabs his open case of computer software and hardware peices, "Oh watch out!" I said, and it all comes spilling out onto the floor. I thought about helping him pick the stuff up, but I imagined his hands trying to touch mine or something. I don't know who this guy is, and his energy feels kind of creepy. So I look for the trash instead and toss my empty bottle of orange juice. He waits for me by the door and we walk out. He opens one door, I open a different one and let myself out. As I untangle my bike, locked and twisted with a bike cord onto the parking meter, he gives me that look. Before he starts to say something I cut him off, "alright, well, thanks for the deal. You take care and good luck with the side hussle on the gaming." I hop on my bike and leave him without a choice. "Thanks.. uh.. bye!"

That Thing

So, I thought about this thing while I lied there in the dark, feeling the skin of my bare thighs against the soft cool sheets. The first time, I never wanted to do it. I was just coming of age and he was already ripe. I was clueless about the whole thing but I convinced myself that I was all about him. I wanted to ignore what I really knew, which was that if there was some convincing to do, then the situation ain’t right. But I did it anyway. The next day there was a fuse inside me that blew and I wanted to blame him. So I said something to him, and he took it, bounced it on the concrete street courts where he played with his boys, shot, and scored two points. I left defeated instead blaming myself for playing alone against a winning team.


I don’t know why I kept at it. It developed into this relationship with the whole thing regardless of who I was trying to love. It was a reoccurring way for this thing to happen. Pretty soon, I began to think of it as a given. This was just what it was. Its not what people said it was cracked up to be. They just like to talk. On the stoop, on the phone, with the girls, all talk. Each time I fooled myself into thinking that there was something else happening along with this thing, that there was something to be excited about, that it wasn’t just about reaching the top, that there were no bounds. But each time I was forced to remember that if there was some convincing to do, then the situation ain’t right. I did a lot of convincing in my time. It never surprised me each time, no matter how hurt I was. I had to allow myself to discover that something real was hard to come by, that I was at odds with coming by something sustainable at all.


So I began to function this way. I let the falseness devour me, and at least there was no more convincing to be done. There were plenty of open invitations and falseness was everywhere. Everybody was involved in it and each time I made it clear that I wanted nothing to build. They were thrilled at building nothingness, too. This became a thing for cheap thrills and nothing else, nothing real, nothing solid, and that was the norm. Everything about life was somewhere else. My work. My family. My intellect. My creative endeavors. Those were the things in life that mattered, but this… this was just a side of unseasoned lettuce, or something more like fried platano maduro because there were times when it actually tasted good.


So everything about building life was moving fast and life was a good goal to have. I felt like a shooting star that never disappeared. Everything I did was building fire to cook feasts and I became too full for side dishes. The world was opening itself up to me and I had more and more to build with. The work became demanding, but all the realness I wanted, was there. I was finally on a winning team and there was no more convincing. This is how I came to know myself and the way I wanted to build life. I wanted nothing that wasn’t real. I wanted only things that could help me build higher, and whenever that thing came around I steered clear watching where it swung because it was only proven to knock things over, having me pick up pieces over again.


After some time I realized I was faced with the temptation to convince myself that the other thing, that side dish, was something I didn’t need to think about. But I didn’t want to fool myself again. I was confronting a challenge. I had to find a new way of thinking about this, of facing this. It was the hardest thing to admit to myself. I wanted somebody who could validate my most inner self. The strength and beauty of sharing the struggle with a devout warrior was an empty lot I happened to have stumbled into. I didn’t know exactly how it came about. Maybe it was the sudden feeling of the cosmos moving between my mind and my womb counting time. But there was also a profound sense of wanting to share a mutual understanding of life with someone committed to live by realness. It was an inconceivable thought I was thinking, that intimacy was not only something that could be sustainable but also nurturing. It was the craziest thought I’ve had since coming to understand what my life was. I felt trapped. I left this kind of desire never knowing how to shape it, and once I came back to it, it was splattered on the ground in some shadowed corner like soft clay left unsculpted, but it was still there, existing. I looked at it with a new set of eyes, though still afraid of it, for it was the one thing that had proven to bring nothingness into my life, and somehow I was compelled to build something of it.


So there I was back in the game. Since I’d been in this new space there were a number of people around me who were building with the world like I was, and one of them took a liking to me. Of course, I was cautious at first. I had to think about whether I was really seeing this or convincing myself. He spoke of, lived, and breathed the struggle. He was mind-fire for others who were building with the world, and so I told myself that the chances of falseness in this, for once, could be at odds. Even if it didn’t work out, it wouldn’t be because of untruthfullness, it would be because we disagreed on one thing or another that couldn’t be compromised because some things are just too important in defining our realness. So I made it clear I was done with side dishes, and he talked all about making feasts, and my appetite was whetted. We spent some time cooking in big pots full of ideas, visions, memories, and dreams, but I was hiding somewhere behind a bush trying to strangle to death this cautious feeling that kept trying to creep up. It followed me everywhere. It was sprinkled into every embrace, behind each rousing thought, heightening itself with every physical contact that came with tingles, fireflies, and rising full moons. Again, I was facing the battle of hope.


Soon enough there we were. We moved in the dark creating sparks in the empty cosmos and I wanted to believe that connection was something that was for real and not just talked about, dreamed about, and hoped for. I’d been holding out, trying to move slow because I wanted to sift through every grain of realness in this, wanting to become acquainted with it, feel its texture, recognize its scent, know that it was really there. But we were at the top of the universe and he wanted to show me that there was a sky above that too. Our bodies were on fire, and for a moment I stepped into the black hole of my mind and there was caution, waving red flags everywhere as I stood with arms crossed, looking indifferent but reading the signs. I decided to side with hope, and desire helped me decide. My open body was present in the dark matter of his sheets, the moment feeling like the universe was sprawled across what was his bed, feeling like we were about to manifest the big bang. I closed my eyes and let my body dance with the stars. His body moved with a graceful fierceness, and I was catching fireworks. My mind became blinded by the flame so my spirit could see what it was like to move without resistance. It was a moment of eternity, but it took place too swiftly. It left me wanting to move towards a new journey in this space we had made together, this time having us take off for light years into climax, but he kissed me, and the sun came up. There was a day to begin and a night to end.


The next day, the image of shaping a new universe was on my mind, but next to me in its physical form was caution still as real as it had always been. And I came to know caution once again, this time at a different place in my life but still with the same message: if there is any level of convincing taking place when it comes to this thing, the situation ain’t right. And I came to know that hope and desire were not enough ingredients for a love recipe. Regardless of having traveled a long distance from the past, the chances of walking into the same old room are still the same. Realness is still hard to come by, and even those who seem to be building with the world allow their realness to become interrupted by desire.

RISK

Risks are the defining points of pivitol moments in life. Love involves risk. Revolutionary action, whether on a personal level or larger communal level involves risk. True revolution is authentic only when built on the foundation of love. Decolonization is a risk. We risk losing a lifetime of investing in lies, at the cost of gaining truth. Fear is what holds us back from entrusting ourselves in action that involves change, risk, acquisition of truth, love. Fear arises from the fact that our hope runs thin. This is why love based on truth is a rare jewel, and most of us leave our loved ones never loving with full human capacity.


Risks are taken when we become so fed up with the funk that any other choice would be suicide. Some of us would rather die a spiritual or physical death than take a risk. Some of us choose to risk our lives for truth, that is, live a life full of risk-taking and embrace the process of acquiring truth, love, and revolutionary action. Risks are taken when we choose to remove ourselves from this world of biased, so-called norms, and free ourselves into ideological freedom. Choosing to risk a prospect of life of spiritual and mental enslavement and embrace new ways of making sense of the world, our lives, and the actions of those around us, is a risk involving responsible autonomy. Risk involves having mercy for those in our lives who choose not to take risks, by seeing the beauty of truth within them, at times straining to come out, that they cannot see themselves, and becoming a reflection of that truth by practicing a relationship between the self and a life full with risking and truth seeking. In other words, a self, continually conscious of the existence of a truth outside of the world as it is given to our eyes, will exude a chance for hope.


Love is a struggle for seeking to define truth. Attempts at love are experiences that expose lack of consciousness to truth in a world that has taught us to lead our lives into a fire of lies. Attempts at love expose us to the ways in which we as individuals have denied ourselves the chance of self-love, and this self-destructive behavior arises out of the fear that our hope for love may not endure or will weaken. We expedite the process of spiritual suicide by perpetuating internalized fallacies. The thought of love in a world full of spiritual and mental enslavement, a world full of fear and deprivation of truth, invokes desire and fear. Desire for the acquisition of love, and fear of failure to acquire it. The act of love within this context involves risk. The persistent struggle with risk builds commitment, which builds the strength of insight, which elevates hope. This process of struggling to find truth in love and love in truth is the framework for revolution, change.


The most significant decision we can make in our lives is to risk our slave identities. We are born into this world free and full of capacity. This freedom becomes domesticated by the one who instills fear into us, leading us into lifetimes of spiritual suicide until our spirits leave our bodies feeling naked with heads bowed down in shame. Risk in life is a window to truth, the truth about the self and its human capacity of heart, mind, and soul. We are lied to and told that risk is a risk against our freedom, when it is through the act of risk that we obtain change, acquisition of truth, love, and freedom from mental and spiritual enslavement. Decolonization is the transformation of the slave identity to make way for the empowered human spirit to thrive in a lifetime commitment to truthfulness. Decolonization can only be practiced by attempting love. Love can only be attempted through risk.


Each rolling tear produced by profound thought is a word from the soul attempting to reach the body. It asks why we are still leading the self through a world of fallacy. It demands that we embrace risk, that we face truth and act in its compliance, that we no longer live in an inner-world of shame, that we become committed to love.

I dug that thing..

I dug that thing
Whatyoumacallit
Dropped a seed rooted deep
Looked into the ground and couldn’t see but
The earth felt cool and sweet against my fingertips
As I took ma time slowly pushing the earth back into its place
Bringin ma mind into this
Whatyoumacallit I was diggin
Watering this space with liquid caution, liquid soul
I was really feelin this
whatyoumacallit
But had no idea what would sprout and unfold

In between ma daily grind I couldn’t ignore the question that rang in ma mind
Some secret anticipation I wanted to ignore
But the sun was so bright, it showed
What...
What am I really sowin on this here ground?
The question came out almost shouting
You answered with rain and fire
Life and death
Inside there was somethin happenin
Some hurricane
A storm
Outside there was stillness
A silence that sounded like some chord that struck outside this
Whatyoumacallit frequency
I wondered if what I had really planted was a rock or a seed