[This text was originally published in AREA Chicago #13 in April 2013]
Are we who we are regardless of where we lay our heads? Selections from the Neighborhood Writing Alliance
The following collection of writings spans a decade and a range of interpretations of housing and home. Yet the interplay between the internal and external is clear throughout. Are we who we are regardless of where we lay our heads? Or are our selves mediated through the experiences to which we are subjected or subject ourselves? Here, seven Neighborhood Writing Alliance writers speak to us directly about living outside, inside, and between “homes.” The Neighborhood Writing Alliance (NWA) provokes dialogue, builds community, and promotes change by creating opportunities for adults in underserved neighborhoods to write, publish, and perform works about their lives. NWA amplifies the voices of writers by hosting free weekly writing workshops; publishing the Journal of Ordinary Thought and a blog, Every Person Is a Philosopher; hosting readings and events; and partnering with other communitybased organizations. You can learn more about NWA at http://www.jot.org.
—Hollen Reischer, Editor of the Journal of Ordinary Thought
NEEDS
Pat Guy (Tricia)
Originally published in “Lost in Darkness: JOT Writers on Housing and Homelessness,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Spring 2002.
I need shelter from
the rain, then snow.
I need a house
that the winds don’t blow.
I need a home,
one that I own.
(Come over here boys)
I need a piece of land
centered around a tree.
I need a 12’ mat,
a concrete slab for three.
I need a home,
one that I own.
(Gina, where are you?)
I need a room and stairs
locked from the three bears.
I need height and space,
a balcony, with midnight sky.
I need a door opener.
GRAVEYARDS IN THE GHETTO
Michael Bowie
Originally published in “Lost in Darkness: JOT Writers on Housing and Homelessness,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Spring 2002.
Picture this; let’s build a prison
But call it a project
Say it’s for development
So no one will object
We’ll make them look pretty,
Yet plain
None of them different
Yet none of them the same
They’ll look clean and green
But in reality just a dream
Decorated with flowers
And trees
Hiding the stench of pee stains
In the hallways
And some other disease
Picture-like windows
To look out
Unprotected
So kids can fall out
Even elevators, make sure they
Never work
Walking up unlit stairwells
Is bound to get you hurt
Good foundation
But holes in the walls
Make nice tunnels
For criminals to crawl
All of them will be
Secure and protected
Some police presence
But not that effective
Even visited by the president
And other political figures
Make them think they’re
Some kind of special niggers
And the best part
Of this design:
To destroy
The black mind
Let’s begin the construction
Of destruction
MOVING
Al Klinger
Originally published in “The Open Gate: JOT Writers’ Visions of Freedom and Liberation,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Spring 2012.
He watched movers remove furniture,
mirrors, books, clothing, shoes, pictures.
Each piece appeared casketed as
if an entombed buddy, chum. Fifty
years floated on the shoulders, in the
biceps, of the Bernard Brothers, as if
they were chosen pallbearers. Efficient,
capable total strangers lay his uncomplaining
companions out in a van
built like a gigantic ice cream box full
of popsicles; fudgsicles maybe. Or
maybe built like an incinerator; solid,
firm like the fist of Muhammad Ali.
Well, what did he expect? Snare drums,
whistles, flaming loops through which
dogs are jumping, tumblers, acrobats
on the high wire, clowns, ladies on one
foot arabesqueing on prancing white
horses festooned with jangling bells
engulfed in organ-grinding music,
surrounded by polka-dot all-encompassing
coveralls, bulldog-muzzled
bulging shoes slapping against the
ground like swollen tongues?
This not a circus, you know. More like
a funeral without the rabbis, priests,
bishops, ayatollahs, catafalques,
memorial services. His tyranny of
possession, his whole lifetime of ownership
being outmaneuvered by time,
eternity. Before he thought he could
defy sliding tectonic plates, tsunamis.
All the illusion ripped away. He is
barely a ripple in the puddle of a
sidewalk.
A CASUALTY OF THE TIMES
A Homeless Ex-Flower Child Wanders the Streets
Charlie Clements
Originally published in “Lost in Darkness: JOT Writers on Housing and Homelessness,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Spring 2002.
Forgive me, I am a dream.
My hands and feet bear wounds of the thief left behind on a cross to suffer the
martyrdom of skepticism.
I carry the corpse of the New Year’s child of a year not yet arrived.
My shattered teeth have been replaced by typewriter keys, my tongue
converted to a paperweight.
I am euphemized in the madhouse, eulogized in my lifetime.
With ball and chain around my dreams I scream my fear on paper!
Things were different once.
For an ancient instant out of time I roamed the streets with chalk in
hand tenderizing the cement with naked poems of playful
rawness, and relentlessly tending the growth of love and peace
in underground gardens.
I was a terrorist then, conspiring to overthrow the world with fiery poems
and powerful roses.
I was eternally young back then, politically left of insane asylum.
Now I’ve become an anachronism, old before my time.
Now I’ve become the prophet of my doom.
The other night I dreamt that I was whipped and pounded to the pavement
by the Bacteria Police.
What could I have done? My clothes were filthy, and my screams were
long outdated.
Though they wore surgical masks and gloves, the antiseptic children of the
21st century ran right past me like GOOD little clones.
Whereupon I expired.
An environmentalist came by, removed my body from the germ-free
landscape, stuffed and took it away to a glass museum
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Allen McNair
Originally published in “I Am Here,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Fall 2011.
The psych ward is under construction
As the patients restructure their lives.
The maintenance crew is restructuring the ward.
Internal emotions change, as does the wing.
Furniture of the mind is uprooted
As physical furniture is uprooted in the unit.
Objects in the objective world are moved around
As the subjects of the subjective are also moved.
Hopefully the unit of the hospital is improved
Like the individuals undergoing treatment.
Through counseling and group therapy
We can get a better handle on ourselves.
Medication helps to stabilize the patients,
Just as setting furniture in a different place
Will stabilize the various rooms on the ward
Where we strive to better cope with our lives.
The hospital is initially turned upside down
As our lives, at first, are upset when brought
Into this hallowed institution as we make
A valiant attempt to right ourselves emotionally.
Some of us want to reconstruct our lives
Which started out in desperate disarray.
Others are still under reconstruction,
Struggling through a mess of difficult emotions.
The hospital unit is slowly put in greater order.
The patients are also slowly becoming more orderly.
Just as external order is ongoing,
So internal order progresses in minds and hearts.
LIVING AT THE MARGINS
Susan House
Originally published in “Lost in Darkness: JOT Writers on Housing and Homelessness,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Spring 2002.
The first time was when I came to Chicago. I didn’t know anyone here, had never been to the city before, and only had a few dollars. I slept the first night in the park at the east end of Lawrence Avenue. The next day I found out what single room occupancy (SRO) hotels and day labor places were. I lived hand to mouth for months until I managed to convince welfare to allow me to go to their industrial training program to learn welding. It was a very hard existence. My take home pay was $12.10 each day. For that I had to work eight hours in a hot factory and travel on the day labor bus an additional hour each way. I had no rights in the workplace, no benefits, and no security. Every single morning I had to be in a line before 5 a.m. to try to get selected for a job. My SRO room was about $40 a week. I walked everywhere because I couldn’t afford a bus token. I used to walk along the driversside of parked cars early on Sunday mornings, looking for change dropped by less than sober people digging for their keys. I used to glean an additional $5 a week that way and would treat myself to a newspaper on Sundays. I lied to the winos who lived in my building and told them I knew how to cut hair and they’d give me change to cut theirs. Luckily, they were too far gone to notice how bad my hair cutting skills were.
I was young and it all seemed adventurous to me, but it was a dead end. In no way did I earn enough money to take a day or two off each week to look for a real job. If I caught a cold and missed a few days of work, I’d have gotten evicted from the SRO.
Welfare’s welding school lasted about three months, then I immediately got a job. My pay leaped from $12.10 per day to $40 per day in a week! It was great. I was able to save some money, get some sturdier clothes for work, and afford salads to go along with my macaroni and cheese dinners. I even got to go to a few movies. Eventually, I started making some friends and even started to date. That man and I lived together and moved to Canada together. Once in Canada, he started to drink and became abusive.
In 1975, I escaped from him in northern Manitoba, hitchhiked to Winnipeg, and hid for four days in an attic there. It was over a holiday and I couldn’t get any money to leave until the banks opened the following week. Bernelda, his cousin’s girlfriend, was hiding me. I was badly beaten, had two black eyes, a ruptured ear drum, bruises everywhere, and was pregnant. I was so nervous that I could neither eat nor rest. I was also homeless again! Luckily, I’d been fanatic about saving money before I met him and had left $500 in an account in Chicago, so I was able to buy a bus ticket. It’s a long ride from Winnipeg, Manitoba to Chicago, Illinois! In retrospect, the distance has become symbolic of how far I’d have to move emotionally in order to recover from that terrible relationship.
Once back in Chicago, I spent the rest of my money on some bus tokens and an abortion. I had no money left for rent. I was a welder and was quickly hired at Stewart Warner, but would have to work for awhile before I could afford a place. I was so broke that I had to go apply for the job and then go to the abortion clinic on the same transfer!
When I moved to Canada, I’d left some boxes of books in the basement of a casual friend. I called her to see if I could sleep in the basement for a month. She was kind enough to agree, but didn’t want me to arrive early in the evening. She lived close to Western and Roosevelt Avenues. It was kind of a rough neighborhood, but it was a roof over my head. I would leave there before 6 a.m. and take the Western Ave. bus all the way to Diversey. I’d walk from Western to Wolcott so I didn’t have to buy a transfer. Once at work, I volunteered for all the overtime (OT) I could get, but even so, sooner or later, I had to leave each afternoon. The first shift ended at 3:30 p.m. and, if I didn’t have OT, I’d have to roam around the city for six hours before I could go back down to Western and Roosevelt.
I developed an elaborate system of clothing, laundry, and other ways to deal with my needs while I had no place to be. I would clean up and change into slacks and a blouse when I left work. I’d take my work clothes to a laundromat a couple of blocks from the factory and wash them, then return them to the factory. After that, I’d walk over to Clark Street, or down to the lake. Sometimes I went to the library, other times I window shopped or went to a movie. The old nature museum that was at 2000 North Clark had free admission, so I spent lots of time in there. In the evenings, they sometimes showed nature films or had lectures. I got to know the Chicago Herpetology Society, a group of folks who did a lot of traveling then gave lectures and slide shows about their travels, and any other groups who used the small auditorium there. I loved the nature museum! On the weekends, I went to Lincoln Park Zoo or just walked in the parks.
After about nine months of that, I could finally afford an apartment of my own. I had saved as much money as humanly possible. After the first couple of weeks, I paid $20 a week for the sleeping space, spent a little money for food and transportation, but saved the rest. I wasn’t able to shake the ghost of how badly I’d needed that little bit of money I’d had in my savings when I escaped from Winnipeg. Being out and about everyday meant I was meeting lots of people. Many of them were other eccentrics who were very kind to me. One helped me find my first apartment, another brought me coffee when I was sick. I was starting to feel like a real part of the human race.
Since that time, I’ve done well. Having a skill, in my case welding, is so important. It was the key to economic freedom for me. The job at Stewart Warner was hot and hard and unhealthy, but they offered medical benefits (I had a tubal ligation because I was acutely aware that a child would have not had a good life with me) and tuition reimbursement. I got to go to college. When I received my degree, I immediately started teaching my fellow workers, many of whom were non-readers.
If I had had to work for minimum wage in a nursing home or done other low-paying menial labor, or had children to support, I’d never have been able to go to school and would probably still be stuck in the daily grind of poverty, fear, and restlessness. I might have even ended up in a relationship with another abusive man. Poverty does horrible damage to women’s self esteem and makes it easy to prey on them.
I do not regret my homelessness, but I do not want to experience it ever again. I’m no longer young and I think I’d find it all too difficult. I continue to work with low literacy level adults and will probably spend the rest of my life trying to help people get out of their dire circumstances. My own past experiences are the fuel that keeps me going. I totally and personally know how difficult life can be when one is living at the margins.
MY NAME IS JAIL
Jerry Hall
Originally published in “I Am Here,” Journal of Ordinary Thought, Fall 2011.
Hello my name is jail
I’m found throughout the world with supreme clientele
For reservations, you need no fees
I’ve housed well-known members of society
My name alone is the opposite of home
Your name becomes a number, even if well known
I’m known by plenty of names when they mention me
The Joint, the Big House, and Penitentiary
I’m also known as the Tank and the Can
I’m a successful establishment for murder and greed
I’ve broken the strongest men down to their knees
If you commit a crime
You’re welcome anytime
I call it a minisuite, it’s really a 6’ Å~ 9’
I’ll give you exactly what you need, no more
You’ll have everything you need once behind my door
But suicide is performed even by those who think they’re so hardcore
So keep up the good work; you’re the ones that are fools
I employ lots of people and am preferred over schools
Everything you do is done when you’re told
I play a major part when people say the world is cold
Also residing here are pimps, pushers, molesters, and creeps
I’ll tell you when to eat, bathe, socialize, and speak
All because you couldn’t behave
You might leave here heading straight to your grave
Once inside you’ll turn into a modern-day slave
I’ve been turned into a Fortune 500 company, with private investors buying my stock
I love taking inner-city kids off the block
The more you visit, your stay gets longer
Your mail starts to fade as you become a goner
There are commissary sheets, but you’ll never see your cash
When visited you’ll remain behind my thick glass
Oh wait, my bad, I’ve made a mistake
You can have a contact visit when you go downstate
I’m not that bad, I’ll let you hold your kid
But add time if you’re out of line and increase your bid
Matter of fact, you can hit the yard for a stroll
Probation or parole, man, I really love those
I’ll turn friends into enemies, bringing tension and beef
I find it humorous the way you display yourself on the streets
I add to your problems, that’s what I “solve” them for
I’m designed for you to come back through my revolving doors
I love to see you come back, greeting you with a hug
I’m associated with alcohol, violence, and drugs
Some rebelled against me and started riots
I have a special place for those to keep them quiet
I guarantee you’ll cry as life passes you by
Your kids turning full-grown, when you left they were knee-high
My name is jail; my doors are open 24-7
You need no money, just time to check in
First off, I thank alcohol for that hit and run
Much respect to violence for you carrying a gun
And my main man, drugs, you in the house, no doubt
I’m easy to get into, but hard to get out
My name is jail!
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