Category: Piece of the Week

by Rajene Thick brown skin with battle scars everywhere, a glance around my face expressing a deep depression and overcoming of sin. I see three tattoos that express the love for the people symbolized amongst each of them. I see coarse hair, which I was born with and struggled with while going through different stages of depression. I remember my different hairstyles as I think of myself, and cry knowing that my hair did not deserve this point of roughness. That’s just the outside appearance of the mirror for the bigger image is withheld inside of my soul, heart and mind.

by Bre’Ann I’m an emotional wreck. Crying is my only good coping skill, not having a mother to cry on or a father I can run to. My sister is gone with the wind. My brother is gone with my freedom. As I stare at my public place of punishment, punishment is my only hope for freedom. Being a highly sophisticated, intelligent, emotionally mature, lonely, and ripped up failure. I see what I have become and it’s not exactly helping my emotions. My mother went to a better place when I was 12 and I got separated from my lovely

by Chance I as a person have a lot of concerns. I will talk about a couple of them, but keep in mind they are just concerns, not beliefs. I feel like a failure. My anger has removed myself and my family from home to home since I was young, but I fought it and conquered it. But when one big problem goes another takes its place. Drug addiction; right now it feels unbeatable. Every ber of me wants them to make me happy, to nd a purpose. It takes me and wraps its warm arms around me. Now that

by Andrew There isn’t much that I can do when I’m locked up. The system is messed up so if they want to point their ngers at you it’s because they got no one else to blame. We come to realize the things that really matter in life because of all the time we got on our hands, we don’t realize it when we’re out on those streets because of all the mind games people play on us youngsters. And there are all kinds of other distractions just by trying to survive the life we gangbangers choose to take. It’s just

by Brianna Instead of confronting my fears of sadness and agony, I tend to run away from them. Most of the time, well the in-between time, I can escape it. Though when I get tired of all the running, I sit back and watch it catch up to me. So I can never say I didn’t see something coming. The escape is always temporary. My form of running is altering my state of mind with drugs to force myself not to have to face all realities of the world and to lift the burden that weighs so heavily on me.

by Chino Them days are over, mobbing around in gee rides, getting at females. Now, I sit in a cell watching my shadow, been down nine months and got a lot more to go. Two months until my birthday, then I will be the big eighteen. I see memorized in my mind, it’s a blur. Seems like it was yesterday chilling with my boys. As I sit here and face maybe, twenty- ve to life, got me thinking who was really there. If I would have stuck to school and sports things would have ended up different. I still can’t believe

by Elizabeth Today at this very moment, Tuesday I feel so low, so sad. I don’t know what to think anymore. I’m stuck in Juvenile Hall just thinking about where did I go wrong? I feel so bad hurting the people I love so much. I just want to talk to them tell them how sorry I was and never meant to hurt them at all. What hurts me the most is when I look back at that court room I see them all, I see him. How could he be so strong and still smile at me? I love

by Sally Bo Thanksgiving is coming up, I want to say Thanks to my mother for always being there and helping me out in times of need.  My father too, for being in my life and teaching me stuff I really didn’t want to know but is helpful in the long run.  My sister for always keeping up with my antics and weird vibe, and especially living another day, month, year.. etc. to explore this wonderful world. I hope that I’ll spend Thanksgiving with my folks and say what I said above to them to show them how much I care

by Bryce There are many things in my life that I own and cherish. From childhood trophies and items my lovely parents got me, to simple things as pictures and blankets my grandmother would make me. Out of these things I tend to cherish and remember the pictures the most. It is more than just a simple picture, it is a photo that means a million words and memories. Something that I will carry with me for the rest of my time living in this world because when you lay your eyes on that picture, it paints a whole world in