Trip To Oregon

by AMJ, San Francisco  It was the happiest when I got to go out of state to go skate with my homie’s. It was about three months ago, when me and my homies/family we went to Oregon to skate all different skate parks. It was I can say, the happiest time of my life. We went all over Portland/Oregon. I mean it was the best adventure. We went camping for a few days, all different camping spots.  Then after that, we went to go meet my sponsor for the first time. She’s hella cool, I’m like a son to her

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2021 = 2022

by Mackey Vesuvius, San Quentin State Prison, CA Year 2021 went by slow at first, but after the sixth month passed by it started to go by fast. 2021 was a year that I want to forget so easily for many reasons. So let me share a few of those reasons with you all!  Number one is the disastrous multiple staged always changing Coronavirus, COVID-19. Delta, Omicron, and whatever else to come with this virus has intimidated the whole world. It change the whole world. I’m in San Quentin State prison environment inherently unhealthiness and how much they don’t care

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To The Beat Community

by Heather Daoust, California Institution for Women in Corona, CA I noticed I always tread lightly when I write for The Beat Without. Maybe too lightly. I pop in and out with short spurts then long silence. I always digest my readers and audience.  I think what screws me up is I’m near thirty and doing life in prison. I think of juvie as kids. Kids, to me, are innocent. I always wished to have a child and when I lost my unborn child it put a holy glow on the idea of any and every child. So, in a

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Sidney Poitier’s Quote

by Mesro Coles-El, San Quentin State Prison, San Quentin, CA “You don’t have to become something you’re not to be better than you were. A person doesn’t have to change who he is to become better.” -Sidney Poitier I admit that I did not know how true this quote was until I got myself locked up. See, I spent a lot of time trying to fit in with people I discovered did not care about me at all. Only my closest friends told me that it was okay to be by myself, but I kept on trying to fit in

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