Vendors
Page 6
Happiness is Love
(and Love is Unity!)
by Michelle Blaisdell
Marginalized for being me,
Stigmatized for what you see,
Broken from a truth we long to be,
These lies cloud the mind,
Now it’s “I” instead of “we.”
Street Roots • August 25-31,2017
Left: Street
Roots vendor
Doug Mareks
reads his
poetry during
A rt in the
Open outside
the Street
Roots office.
Art
"“’Open
Bottom right:
Cole Merkel,
Street Roots’
Vendor
Program
director, holds
the mic for
M addie
Brown-Clark.
treet Roots poets held a reading
of their original work Aug. 18 as
part of the Old Town Chinatown
Community Association’s Art in the
Open festival. The hour-long reading
featured 10 Street Roots vendors.
Many of their poems had previously
been published in Street Roots’
weekly newspaper or biannual zines.
“This was my first-ever poetry
reading,” Street Roots vendor Aileen
McPherson said. “I’ve done school
readings, which is completely
different. I think Street Roots helped
to nurture the writer in me, giving me
that voice so I could finally share that
voice.”
Aileen said she wasn’t as nervous
this time, with the reading on the
sidewalk outside Street Roots’ Old
Town office.
“These are going to be really
emotional for me because there’s a lot
of power behind the words,” she said.
“My writing causes me lots of
nervous anxiety because I’m sharing
things that I haven’t shared in years
because I wasn’t allowed to. Street
Roots gave me that voice. People
listen.”
Art in the Open, a two-day art
celebration, was organized by the Old
Town Chinatown Community
Association. The weekend celebration
included music, karaoke and sidewalk
chalk art in front of local businesses
and nonprofits.
S
What do we do
when we can’t hold that face,
What do we do
when the truth is not faced,
What do we do when
there is nowhere left to run,
Lost in a nightmare,
so far from what is one?
There is a dense shadow
that is creeping over us,
Binding what is real,
we become oblivious,
We must not forget the Light of Unity,
If happiness and true love are
what we want to be.
Answers to Page 15 Puzzles
Bottom left:
Aileen
McPherson
says Street
Roots has
given her a
platform to
express herself.
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