For a Student Upstate Doing Time

April 22, 2008

K___________

I know it’s been a while, but I got your address from A________ and decided to write you. I don’t understand what it’s like to be in your situation; I am sure you must be scared and confused most of the time. A_______ told me you are now part of the Five Percenters, which if I am not mistaken is a group that advocates for the rewriting of our history to emphasize more African and Nubian examples. I don’t know if I agree with the Five Percenters, but I do agree that this country has been irresponsible in it’s recounting of history and has excluded examples of African, Nubian, and Sub-Saharan history in favor of white, Occidental history. I think it’s a shame and that is why I am sending you the Xerox pages from the February 2008 National Geographic that highlights how the Nubians in Sudan where one of the only people who kept Egyptian history alive after its pinnacle. The article also talks about how African history, especially as it relates to African people (regardless of where they are from), has been hidden for years and it wasn’t even until the 1960’s that archeologists thought of studying African history, etc. In many ways, it was what Malcolm X was pushing for in American society and one of the reasons why I think he was such a special man; he brought attention to that which most people would want to keep quiet. And for that he was a hero. And for that they had to assassinate him.
I am sorry that I am talking about history and not how you must be feeling, but you now how Cura is always going to be a teacher, regardless of what he is doing. There is a big side of me that feels that I failed with you, that is trying to keep you off the street and get you to pass your classes. But there is a bigger side that feels that there is nothing I could have done because what you did outside of school I wasn’t a part of. That’s part of the main reason why I didn’t go see you while you were being arraigned or at Riker’s. Part of it though also was me not wanting to go to prison, even if it was to visit one of my favorite students. I still can’t make sense of what you did, even though I would be stupid if I couldn’t realize why you did what you did. You did it for money, pure and simple, but I know that you weren’t the only one involved ( I talked to J.C.). I don’t understand for the life of me why you would have taken all the blame, although I think it’s because your little friends (K______ and that other asshole) sold you out for a reduced sentence. That’s the shit I was talking about when I would tell you guys that everyone talks to the cops and that slogans like don’t snitch and snitches get stitches were bullshit and that people in the inner-city were the ones that suffered the most from silence when it came to making their neighborhoods better, safer places to raise families.
I want you to do a couple of things that I think might benefit you when you get out of prison. This is not a time to get lazy and feel sorry for yourself; this is a time when you want to realize the mistakes you have made but more importantly why you made them, Kenday. This is the time for you to start getting your GED and possibly college credits so you can get your life back on track. I am sure you feel alone and scared but that it what it is like to feel like an adult and even though you are behind bars. The U.S. incarcerates the most amount of people in the world; we are the biggest jailers, and it is no coincidence that the majority of people in prison are black and brown. However, realizing this you should have said fuck that that ain’t for me; I refuse to be a pawn in the white-man’s world. And now you are in the middle of it all. My biggest fear is that you become institutionalized or begin to believe the bullshit that the white man is out to get you. The conflicts in the world and in your life are bigger than the white man. They have been going on before the white man came and they will be here when the white man is gone. And those forces have to do with those who have and those who have not. Those who have are going to keep what they got; those that ain’t got shit are going to try to get theirs, and they will do it anyway possible. You have to start looking at it from a class/status perspective, Kenday. Like those that got versus those that ain’t got. The problem is that to get is not only a matter of getting what you think is your piece; sometimes, you have to earn your piece of the got. What I mean, brother, is that life is fucking hard but if you plan it out and provide for your future, then it get’s easier and easier. You will never have a life of luxury, but neither will I and we are men of action and that doesn’t suit men of action.
Brother, I want you to take care of yourself in that little hell, and I want you to be reading during all of your spare time. You have a lot of catching up to do and I know they got a library where they are keeping you at. If you even want recommendations of books of would like some guidance picking stuff to read, let me know. But right off the bat, I would recommend Jimmy Santiago Baca who became a poet in prison and managed to save his life from the misery combine. He juked a Wordsworth book from the library cart one day during a riot and read it cover to cover. Wordsworth is cool but I recommend Jimmy Santiago Baca who is like a Chicano (Mexican-American) Wordsworth. I would also recommend the poet Nazim Hikmet who was a Turkish poet and was in jail most of his life for being a Communist. Imagine being where you are right now because of your belief in a political system, not because you did anything wrong. Also, I would recommend Cesar Vallejo who spent time in prison also for his political beliefs. But more importantly, I would try to get some books on the Nubians or the kingdom of Kush which was a very important part of history that is often left out. I want you to read until your eyes fall out and I want you to work on getting your GED and possibly getting some college credits, man. Don’t waste this time feeling anything but like you are going to walk out of that prison a better man with a zero balance.