To be a poet is to be a thinker

A challenger

A believer in the magic of our own minds

Sometimes I find my mind trapped in an abyss of liquor stores, boarded houses, and empty refrigerators

While the cathartic release of ink from ballpoint drops shackles and my thoughts run like it has found the underground railroad

Just north of gentrification and west of the homelessness that plagued my family

Poetry runs in my family

And has been running in my family for ages

We never believed in cages, but in God

So it was only natural that poetry manifested itself as the light at the end of a tunnel of darkness

Poetry is the fume that sparked a revolution in my mind

I guess Heron did say that it would not be televised

Somewhere between Macarthur Boulevard and the hills at which I was schooled, I cannot say that I decided to become a poet

I can only say that imagery, metaphor, simile allowed me a path to challenge people to hear herstory and to think