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The rawness of these poems, their boldness, and their vitality inspired me — it's the real gasoline fueling my wheelchair. And the final workshop culminated with these brave young poets reading their poems in front of more than 30 inmates and security guards. The program was such a success that the juvenile detention center invited me to lead six more workshops with a new group of detainees.

These workshops will also culminate in a final poetry performance. Can I count on you to support this next chapter? Keep reading to learn more! With Love. Short on time? Watch the video instead! Not all tattooed like I thought. No necklaces with skulls. And black gothic clothes. These young men.

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Play basketball. And yet staff tell me behind closed doors. Who am I to expose the details? To point fingers and seek explanations. Like a court judge? Not me! As I read to them. I learn there's one thing. No bars can imprison.

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Imagination unbound: Poetry. Smaller than a mouse. What can trap it? I can't promise. Set a man free. But I've seen. A poem light up. Nothing less than the fire. A human being in language letting. Of desolate Hearts. If you're still listening. I can tell you. That time and time again. Its perfume must be. And bring it forth. And yet sometimes.

These teenagers here. Most are gone. Within 15 days. An orphanage hired me to give a poetry reading thanks to my sponsors. I'm keeping the orphanage anonymous to protect its privacy. Through the course of the poetry reading, the participants were vulnerable, and so the elephant in the room emerged: in the orphanage, two young adults with intellectual disabilities got pregnant.

The mother was separated from her child and forced to abandon the loving environment of the orphanage due to an untrue stigma that someone with an intellectual disability can't be a legitimate parent. I used poetry with the orphanage staff to empathize with the mother's and father's feelings and needs, encouraging more compassion. But she needs more help to find her child and give the residents with intellectual disabilities sex education tools while they create poetry.

Homelessness Looms: the race to house near-paralyzed Juan Carlos. A young man named Juan Carlos, who is my poetry student and is in a wheelchair, was suddenly faced with his father's colon cancer. Juan Carlos and his father suffer from financial scarcity and don't have the support of family that can help. Through a poetry reading, I started a campaign that literally kept Juan Carlos off the streets.

As his father faces chemo yet again, more funds must be raised, and more poems and poetry readings must be offered to fuel the fire.

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We need to keep poetry rolling, keep Juan Carlos off the streets! In Tezontepec, Mexico, a neighborhood is facing serious health hazards due to toxic fumes from an abandoned mine overwhelmed with illegal dumping by industrial companies. The residents are struggling to make themselves heard by officials even the law is failing themso we created poems about their love for nature and the loss of clean air, as a form of peaceful protest.

With the help of environmentalist Ron Sawyer, we plan to funnel these powerful testimonies of the residents to advocate for human-first waste management plans. We see the mess we are and honor it as we fight for clean air! You can help bring poetry and creativity to the lives of incarcerated teenagers, providing an outlet for self-expression and inspiring hope for a better future.

Go back home to learn more. Search this site. Embedded Files. About Me. Photos: Elizabeth Escobar — ibY 1. My mission. My timeline so far. Help my ongoing projects. Poetry goes to prison. Photo: Elizabeth Escobar — ibY 1. Unexpected Mentorship by Mary Oliver. Educational Pursuits and Broadening Horizons. Literary Career Abroad. Mentorship and Focus on Craft.

Life Transformation and Parenting. Literary Journaling. Promoting Inclusion through Poetry. Influence Beyond Poetry. Photos: Elizabeth Escobar — ibY Photos: 1. Yolanda Belendez Ramirez family photo. Elena Poniatowska pictured is the author of more than forty works, including the classic "Massacre in Mexico. Carlos Neri's Facebook Blue Flower Arts Photo: Shareece McCauley's Facebook.

Dodge Poetry Festival Sandy Gans Retrieved from Flickr. These wild words! Where does Ekiwah get them from? Nuzzo asked her to send him a videotape of the children. It just so happens that Nuzzo is himself a poet as well as a surgeon. I had to do something. Next week, the teenage poet and his father will arrive in New York, and on Dec.