By Sonia Gutierrez
Knock, knock, knock.
America, there are children
knocking at your door.
Can you hear their soft
knocks like conch
shells, whispering
in your ears?
Weep, weep, weep.
Can you hear
the children whimpering?
Their moist eyes
yearning to see friendly TV-gringo-houses
swing their front doors
wide open. [Read more…]
By Viet Mai
My grandma died
and I don’t know how to cry about it.
I was too busy working.
Too busy playing Halloween.
Too busy trying to create a future,
that I forgot about losing my past.
My bloodlines feel so thin at times,
it’s no wonder why I get anemic. [Read more…]
By Will Falk
National Poetry Month happens to mark the year anniversary since I set out on the road to dedicate my life to the struggle against this dominant culture hell-bent on destroying the world.
Questions arise on this road, questions that I must answer if I am going to continue on this way.
One of the questions I seek answers for involves poetry. I love poetry. I love reading poetry, I love listening to poetry, and I love writing poetry. But, the hour is extremely late, and poetry means nothing if it is not used as a weapon in defense of the real world. [Read more…]
By Anna Daniels
He pushes his shopping cart
Down the via dolorosa of 45th Street
The dull clunk of glass bottles
Clattering of cans, the rattle of metal
And wheels on the pavement
Announce him [Read more…]
By Steve Kowit
A message from the SDFP editors: Last year we kicked off National Poetry Month with a selection of works by San Diego poets. Steve Kowit was one of those poets. We are deeply saddened to learn of his death. The encomiums that he deserves and the extensive remembrances of his life as a poet, essayist and educator will be forthcoming. But at this moment, in this place, we remember Steve’s poetry and what he had to say about poetry making.
Poetry, when it is at its most ineffable, transports us to places we had no reason to believe language could take us. … [Read more…]
By Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes
While the island sleeps
I dream
cargo ships anchored off harbor
trees
dropping ripened fruit on sidewalks
salty breeze turning
rooftop fans [Read more…]
By Adolfo Guzman-Lopez
Salvador Valtierra preaches on the corner of Fifth and Broadway
The bus depot and crossroad for pedestrian masses
This is the corner where the stock market crashed
Where Reaganomics and its cranes revived a financial district
Booming with peep-show parlors
Residence hotels and adult bookstores
Now it’s the corner of ninety nine cent stores
And ninety nine cent lives
Lives lived out with stubby fingers
Clorox cracked skin
And tennis elbow
From pushing vacuum cleaners [Read more…]
By Doug Porter
A book tour by a former SeaWorld trainer critical of the company’s treatment of Orcas has led to the theme park releasing a five year old cell phone video depicting the author using racial slurs during a drunken conversation.
Critics of SeaWorld are saying this action is just another example of a sub rosa campaign by a company seeking to defend itself against charges that it mistreats the animals it keeps in captivity. The company saw one million fewer customers in 2014 as compared to the previous year.
While the latest move by SeaWorld had led La Jolla’s Warwick’s bookstore to cancel a signing event for “Beneath the Surface” author John Hargrove, it appears to have energized protesters organizing an Easter Sunday demonstration at the company’s Mission Bay location. [Read more…]
Hail Pachuco! by raúlrsalinas Kicks It Off
By Brent E. Beltrán
April is National Poetry Month and us litera-locos y locas at San Diego Free Press are celebrating by, once again, posting poetry and poetry/spoken word videos throughout the month.
I have been tasked with curating this internet exhibition of verse. I don’t consider myself a poet (though I confess I’ve written a few poems) but I do know many through my days of publishing while co-owner of Calaca Press.
Calaca published dozens of mostly Latino poets and writers over 13 years. Among those published were Chicano literary icons such as alurista, Francisco X. Alarcón, Abelardo “Lalo” Delgado and my mentor, raúlrsalinas, as well as local scribes like the Taco Shop Poets, Francisco J. Bustos, Michael Cheno Wickert, Ken10 and Viet Mai. Recently I’ve helped North County writer Sonia Gutierrez and LA scribe Iris De Anda self publish their first tomes of poetry.
Though not schooled in the literary arts literature has always been near and dear to my heart. Being able to artistically sling words together is a true craft that must be honed like any other. [Read more…]
By Jim Miller
Baseball season is here again and with it comes one of the last times in my only son’s fleeting childhood that I have the opportunity to help coach his team. This brings much joy and more suffering because, as we all know, most of the game involves failure.
When you watch young people pitch, they throw balls more often than not. And when they try to hit, they strike out a lot. It’s a house of pain.
So you spend a great deal of your time telling them to keep their heads up and to stay in it. Indeed, the game is hard enough that, for lots of our young people bent on more immediate gratification, the patience and work it takes to get better is too much for them. [Read more…]
By Ernie McCray
(This poem was written to kickoff the 1st Annual Social Justice and Education Conference at San Diego City College, March 26-27, 2015)
I look around me,
breathing in deeply
as I reflect on the totality
of what I see.
Before me, a man lays sleeping
on a downtown street
that jumps with a crisp
four/four time Hip-Hop beat,
bouncing from an upbeat retreat,
where folks hang out,
chillaxed to the max
as it’s the “Thank God it’s Friday,”
day of the week. [Read more…]
By Ishmael von Heidrick-Barnes
Our Lady of Encinitas
is sliding down the lip of a wave
on rails
Lotus sun
unfolding
Wind thrashed tunic
splashing
light
Palms pressing
misty beads into prayers
the fin of her hands
carving
blue glass [Read more…]
