November 2023 Monthly Roundup
Welcome back, Waywards reader.
Here’s an article I wrote that was published this month:
From Death Row, Keith LaMar Has Built a Movement for Love, Art and Abolition / Truthout / 11-16-23
As far as updates go, I’ll note that a piece I submitted in October — one mentioned in my previous monthly roundup — won’t be edited until next month, I’m told.
This month, Inlandia: A Literary Journey, an online journal published by the Inland Empire-based Inlandia Institute, published two of my poems.
I also visited Illinois, as planned, and I wrote a few poems these past few weeks.
You can check out the new poems below the photos from my Illinois adventure.
Poetry for a Debt Jubilee
I heard two men the other day
Say student debt ought to be repaid
As if erasing it penalizes
People who really make sacrifices
In response, I’ll say it was silly
That they claimed those who exercise responsibility
Are punished by loan forgiveness
Thinly veiled Social Darwinism; survival of the richest
As if all the offspring of which
Really practice more self-discipline and are frugal and shit
As if those not given a hundred thousand to spend, simply make poor financial decisions
Just ignore intergenerational wealth transmission
Forget that tuition was once only a couple hundred bucks
Even at premiere state universities, like Berkeley, it didn’t cost much
It was widely understood
Higher education is and should be a public good
Until not-so-covert privatization shifted the burden
To each student-turned consumer, to each individual person
Changing what ought to be a transformative co-learning experience
Into a business that further benefits children of well-heeled parents
While young people whose backgrounds weren’t characterized by affluence
Whose families lacked influence
Who held down gigs as teenagers or who served food at dormitory dining halls
Took out loans for college, otherwise they wouldn’t have had the wherewithal
Compelled to invest in themselves to get a degree
For a chance at decent life prospects, they had little choice but accept the terms and agree
What better to discipline the future workforce than a binding obligation with interest rates?
After graduation, you’re forced to accept crappy jobs and subpar wages as ineluctable fate
Still, some make an assumption and presume
The moral superiority of those born with a silver spoon
Pretend that the progeny of the plutocracy don’t have family pockets than run deep
Never mind the trough of entitlement from which the professional-managerial class feeds
Empowered to give orders or be creative and well compensated
Cycles of social reproduction continue unabated
Equipped with cultural capital, they can believe the story
That they’re more deserving, and act all self-congratulatory
Even at elite schools, they’re taught each semester
By poorly paid, precariously employed adjunct professors
Instructors burdened by rent they can’t afford
Many make payments on MOHELA and before that did so on MyFedLoan.org
In the two-tier system, some are treated as lesser, like academic peasants
Tenure erodes as more money goes to upper-level administrators and presidents
Students compete against each other in the context of a market economy
That they see themselves as customers instructors must please is understandable, honestly
So you’ll have to forgive me
Please excuse me for unpacking the asininity
Spoken by those gentlemen in my vicinity
They can think what they want, but let’s clear up the misunderstanding
If you’re struggling, you’re not alone; you’re not a loan, you see
Plenty of us can band together to produce new knowledge, make poetry
And insist upon a celebratory debt jubilee!!!
Class Division and Intimate Interpersonal Schism
Like Buddha in the palace
Before he encounters
Real pain and renounces
His royal life of leisure
You’d rather focus on your pleasure
Others can suffer; you’ll drink from the gilded chalice
Like Brenda in Roth’s “Goodbye Columbus”
Taking for granted life’s comforts
Moral development stunted
Taught to manipulate interpersonal relations
While pursuing a pricey education
I assume you'll everything you ever wanted
While I’m like Portnoy, complaining
Poetry in lieu of therapy, instigating
Yet the verse is a joy to read, right? Scintillating.
If only I could consistently demonstrate such swagger
Maybe you’d miss me and remove the heart-piercing dagger
To quell my anger; then I wouldn’t be vacillating between hating and venerating
He doesn’t text her anymore, though
Before he was too vulnerable and excessively self-disclosed
Sharing his aerial highs and his ice-cold Cocytus lows
He gave you the key to his heart, and you cracked open the door
Played with him like a puppy before you got bored
You couldn’t bear to see him like the emperor, wearing no clothes
She’s a heartbreaker, but he brought it on himself and can’t hate her
At the gates of Hell, they meet and he’s submerged like a frozen laker
Burned by the cold, he hurts now and will later
Maybe, I act like I’m Petty, but “there ain’t no easy way out”
Yeah, we “Don’t Speak,” yet you know what I’m saying, No Doubt
Like a butterfly, you flap your pretty wings; the effect stings and I still care
Now me and that other guy have something in common
I guess I’m getting soft, and he’s been that way, like cooked ramen—
Or, perhaps some moisture-wicking polyester blend with cotton
You’re the finest lily in the field, however, and I’m Solomon
I know you were blown away by my love bombing
Was it a “just war”? I’m not sure anymore; now I’m facepalming
Longing to hear your voice, for you to be calling
Still under your spell, as though I was a character in a novel by J.K. Rowling
Read you like a book; you not kissing me has inspired word wizardry, darling
Shameless, despite mistakes made, yet you’re no Emmy Rossum
Nonetheless, you motivated me to give parts of my psyche a good overhauling
A good girl, I suppose, but she knows I’m still heartbroken, acting Petty and free fallin’
More than happiness?
While moving so rhythmically
She said so convincingly
That she just wanted him to be happy
It was the nicest remark
He’d ever heard while hard
Wrong felt so right in the dark
They kissed before he exited the car
Their bodies no longer apart
He’d gone so long, come so far, for a false start
They lie beside each other
Snuggled beneath the covers
Taking turns mistaking themselves for lovers
He wanted to keep her and was direct
She said she wanted to be kept
The two embraced, meeting breast to breast
Fueled by desire to help make things better
Destiny claimed they weren’t meant to do that together
Different storms with different degrees of severity to weather
Despite fate taking upon itself to sever
The bond seen in birds of the same feather
We’ll decide whether we bury the hatchet or the treasure
There’s more to life than this
Life is about more than happiness
Unless, it’s about finding what we missed and rediscovering shared bliss
What You Know is Right
When you’re sick of experiencing pain
Pain with obvious causes still hard to explain
Pain related to feeling estranged
When you’re tired of hurting all the time
Hurting when people pretend to be kind
Hurting—heart, soul and mind
When you’re alone with excruciating emotion
Alone with vociferous thoughts causing commotion
Alone and forgotten down in the abyssal ocean
When you refuse to let them call it help when it feels like torture
Refuse to let them substitute superficial prevention for cure
Refuse to let them tell you being controlled means being heard
When you’re done with all the patronizing bullshit
Done with those who try to force you to suffer through it
Done with those determined to make you endure it
When you know they wouldn’t last a minute in your shoes
You know they couldn’t bear the burden that you do
You know they could never understand when you sing the blues
When you have little to lose and deep down they’re afraid
Deep down they fear you’ll see through the charade
Deep down they fear you’ll burn bright as they fade
When they realize their authority will not be obeyed
You realize there is more that you have to say
You realize you can help others as they find their way
Then you’re not far from the spark that you’re prepared to light
You’re prepared to embark on that journey, to fight your fight
You’re prepared to do what you know is right
Love Torn to Become Infinite
A battle inside rages
Confined in carnal cages
Condemned to rewrite the pages
He tries despite how much he hates it
Acting gleeful to seem well, like it ain’t shit
Like life is no hassle and all is amazing
As if it's alright to be constantly chafing
Like the crushing weight of an anvil don't phase him
The princess locked herself in the castle and kept the toad waitin’
He does his best to resist like a vassal who loathes subordinating
Desirous self-interest at last will succumb to sharing, repairing love torn to become infinite
We’ve reached the end of the road, Waywards reader. I’ll take you on a spin again before too long, though. Until then, we can all try to have ourselves a December to remember.