This is a farewell dedicated to KALW, FM 91.7 radio in Solano Education for firing me, even though I did good. I poured my heart and soul out to being a good radio producer and journalist at KALW, 91.7 FM radio out of San Francisco. You did an incredible job teaching us the original Uncuffed Radio crew. We started at Solano State Prison. I thank Solano State Prison officials and Department of Corrections Rehabilitation for having the heart to create such an independent project radio podcast. I am grateful. Now that KALW and the Education Department at Solano State Prison/San Francisco have fired me and other team players from the original Uncuffed as an artist, as a poet, and journalist, and an audio producer I must speak out. Normally, people are rewarded for hard work and success in a field. Our podcast, in original Uncuffed Solano, was mentioned as one of the best new podcasts to listen to just before the pandemic long lockdown began. But instead of being rewarded for our success, KALW, 91.7 in Education Solano prison fired us once the COVID slowdown took place on March the second, 22nd they [unclear] us. I have not broken any rules and lived up to the contract with KALW Solano Education Department.
The firing of me stinks with racism and discrimination. I want people to know how hypocritical and biased KALW and Solano Education [were]. It was okay for KALW when I got paid for my yoga piece to take that money back to the radio station instead of giving it to me. Feels like I’m back in school in a free world where I was treated a certain way because of my skin color and the lack of comprehension. Back then I acted out because I didn’t know better. As Maya Angelou said, “When you know better, you do better.” I know better now, and worked hard on becoming a radio journalist, audio podcast engineer. I know better, and now create audio pieces and podcasts and radio that people enjoy, and folks who know me could be proud of. Yet I was fired today, March the second, 22nd from Uncuffed Radio program. We original radio producers of Uncuffed Solano created and my heart is crying, my heart is dying, but I recovered. I always do, and I do even greater things. Not that it is important for them to remember me, but you will remember me. Dedicating these poems to KALW, because of the, I don’t know, the seemingly racist thing they had going on there. This is dedicated to KALW and the Solano Education Department. “Look Away” it’s called.
It took a life sentence to show me how to love today.
It took a life sentence to show me how to look away.
So, close your eyes if you don’t like the color of my skin.
Close your eyes if you’re not willing to look within.
It used to bother me what you had to say.
I would meet hate for hate.
It took a life sentence to show me how to forgive.
It took a life sentence to show me how to live.
So, close your eyes if you don’t like my voice.
Close your heart if you don’t like my love.
It took a life sentence to show me how to give.
It took a life sentence to show me how to love.
So, look away if you don’t like the color of my skin.
Better yet, look within, for I’ll love you anyway.
This one dedicated to KALW and to the Solano Education Department. It’s called “Go On.”
I cannot go on like this, but I will go on,
Even though my podcast,
My radio songs have been taken away from me by KALW 91.7 FM.
I’ve been fired as if I had done something wrong.
All I’ve done is create good audio.
I cannot go on like this.
When I do something good and human it’s twisted
And turned into ego by KALW and Solano Education
That don’t know how it is when someone
Or organization tried to take away your humanity
Like KALW/Solano Education has done.
We did award-winning work there.
Our cast, our podcast mentioned in the New York Times,
Yet the original Uncuffeded cast was fired today,
Thrown away like old shoes,
Fired if we robbed a bank or stole a car.
We put out legal and good work and walked in our own shoes.
I cannot go on like this, but I will go on,
On and on, even though on is off.
You let your ego get the best of you
And fired folks because you thought it was a thing to do.
Tell me one rule I broke.
Tell me one journalistic law I infringed
When you on both sides could not check your ego in at the door.
Instead, KALW chose to destroy a beautiful original Uncuffed program
And blame the fall on others.
You chose to lie about how and where Uncuffed started.
It did not start at San Quentin.
Don’t speak about journalistic ethics
When you choose to take the good and call it bad.
I was paid $600 for a yoga piece,
And you chose to take that money
And did whatever it is it was you did with it.
Don’t speak about journalistic integrity and belief;
Any belief in real education in prison,
When you could not check your ego in at the door,
And the best work isn’t good enough for you.
Now you have students, and you only pretend to care.
Students who don’t want to be there
And exist there only to get time off.
And you are just there to get paid.
KALW said they will use mentors to teach audio,
Yet there are only two of us original cast left.
The rest have been paroled or up for parole and gone.
Once again I am left behind
Like when I played Pozzo in Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett.
Everyone else have long paroled
Yet I cannot go on like this,
But I will go on, on and on,
Even though on is off.
And this one here is dedicated to KALW in Solano Education. It’s called “Misdirections.”
People wonder why he tends to the plants like he does,
Touching them,
Them touching him.
People wonder why he sits looking at the sky,
Tending to the birds.
The birds sing to him, and he to them,
Touching spirits, sharing freedom.
People wonder why he spends so much time
Sharing affection with the plants and birds,
Because it’s against the law
For a man in the Department of Misdirection to be human,
To touch, sing, and sing with others.
Here it’s against the law to be human.
Here it’s against the law for men to like women,
To touch, hug, and kiss a woman,
Even on visits.
Here it’s against the law to be a man and like women.
Don’t wonder why but look to the bars in your eyes that blind you
From seeing a man is a man.
Look to the bars in your eyes that blind you
From seeing men in prison are human.
Look to the bars in your superhuman, perfect people,
In your eyes looking down your long sunburnt noses.
No, don’t wonder why,
But look to the bars in your eyes
That imprisoned your spirit
When you scream sexism and discrimination.
Don’t wonder why.
Don’t speak of equal rights,
Don’t speak of human rights,
Don’t speak of right to choice,
Don’t speak of animal rights,
Don’t speak of saving the earth,
Don’t speak of any of those damn things
You perfect men and women.
Don’t speak of any of those things
I your phony, loving hearts.
I am the voice of the non perfect people
Who make mistakes in life,
The homeless, the prisoners,
The lost and lonely, the loving and the peaceful,
The colorful.
No matter what the long nose, sunburnt, hypocritical,
Perfect people say, don’t listen to them.
Continue to be human.
Men continue to like women.
Women continue to like men,
People continue to like people,
Don’t listen to them.
Continue to be human,
Continue to love, to live, to touch, and share moments,
Despite the sunburnt people,
Despite the Department of Misdirection,
Continue to be human.
Don’t listen to them.
Don’t listen to them,
For the bars in their eyes are their own.
And I hope people can write in and express their feelings about the podcast and my job being taken away to Solano State Prison and to KALW, especially, who had the most influence out of San Francisco, 91.7. And I doubt I get my job back, but I want them to know that people appreciated what we created from inside here, and we should not have been canceled out, the original cast of Uncuffeded Solano radio.
These commentaries are recorded by Prison Radio,
