A Cabrillo High School Dreamer’s Poem

A poem dedicated to all the Dreamers and to all the people who support them, written by a Dreamer from Cabrillo High School. Watch the video at VoiceWaves.

A New Home Called Frostbite

A poem highlighting homelessness in the city of Merced and Merced County. According to the Merced City and County Continuum of Care, the City of Merced homeless count dropped very slightly from 318 to 310 in 2018, though the number of displaced people in Merced County rose from 454 to 514. Read more at We’Ced.

Toxic Mask-Ulinity

A poem. Read at The kNOw

Our love is not so different

Merced recently joined San Francisco, New York, and others on the growing list of cities hosting Pride Week to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community. Student activist Layla Ornelas shares her poetry about how far LGBTQ+ rights have come, and how far they still need to go. “Our pride will never waiver. Our fight will never fade.” […]

Vitality: A poem

Fresno college student Patrick Antunez describes the unbridled skill and energy of a lion stalking prey in a poem exploring what it means to be alive titled “Vitality.” He contrasts images of power with quiet and vulnerable moments. “You go from running in your city / To chasing a flickering light / Scared, that the […]

Podcast with The kNOw in Fresno

In this new podcast, youth reporters in Fresno talk with a local poet, Shelley Fairbanks, who shares her experience as an LGBTQ person and how she came to start writing about her life. “I felt the need to write.” Listen to the podcast at The kNOw.

Words of incarceration: poems from #SchoolsnotPrisons Merced

Weekends spent visiting an incarcerated uncle, spiced-up ramen noodles from the jail cantina and a web search to find one’s name and a list of arrests. These moments flashed through poetry on display as part of a Merced art event dealing with mass incarceration and youth imprisonment. “Suffice it to say, court records will outlive […]

Poetry: My favorite color

Fresno 16-year-old Angel Vargas uses the colors of the rainbow in this poem to explore a vision of herself. The colors represent her aspirations, dreams and self-doubts. “Oh, I wish for a life more colorful, / When I look at the sky all I see are overcast clouds.” Read more at The kNOw.

My president will never be orange

In an anonymous poem, a writer contrasts the hope felt during Barack Obama’s presidency, and the despair felt with President Donald Trump. “My President was Black, he will never be Orange / Your President makes me feel unsafe, I just can’t ignore it.” Read the full poem at We’Ced.

We are still here

Youth reporter Ben Novotny took to prose and verse to express his defiance against bigotry, hate and abuse of power. It’s a poem that could be chanted in the streets. “We are still here because we cannot let great power go unchecked.” Read Novotny’s poem at VoiceWaves.