Motown! I’m comin’ home now. The swallows of Kabul will continue to soar and rise into the blue, dusty skies above the city, and I will keep your memory alive in my American soul. The struggle is long and hard, but peace is an eternal fresh spring that can quench the thirst of a nation and keep its cities alive forever.

Watch for The Made in Michigan Literary Walk at Wayne State University Saturday, June 30 from Noon-5:00pm featuring Jim Daniels, Anne-Marie Oomen, Maria Mazziotti Gillan, Susan Whitall, Brett Callwood, Bill Harris, Philip Sterling, Melba Joyce Boyd, Doreen O’Brien, Francine Harris, Rev Robert B. Jones with M.L. Liebler, Terry Blackhawk, Teresa Scollon and more. FREE. Sponsored by The WSU Student Senate Budget Committee, The WSU Press, Poets & Writers, Inc. The WSU Motown Learning Community and The Detroit Artists Market. For schedule and more info go to http://wsupress.wayne.edu/books/952/Wide-Awake-in-Someone-Else%27s-Dream#news1

Here’s a small taste from the bitter-fruit buffet he’s serving up in his lengthy piece, “A Ghost Story: Restructuring Detroit,” on the CounterPunch website:

Detroit’s reality is already the neoliberal nightmare; relentless cutbacks in education, health, and other social services. What seems inevitable is that ‘restructuring Detroit’ (unless resistance can prevent it — as I have previously argued elsewhere) will look an awful lot like the now-notorious ‘structural adjustment’ programs imposed on the developing world by the major multilateral financial institutions — the IMF, the WTO and the World Bank — throughout the neoliberal era. Systematic privatization of common pubic resources; deregulation of corporate power; savage attacks on social services, working standards and basic quality of life for ordinary People; all as a way to even further enrich and empower elites. The infamous “Shock Doctrine,” in Motown rhythm. This is the noxious, authoritarian political reality of “restructuring.” No wonder they hide the term behind comforting lies like ‘”consent” and “fiscal stability.”

The study looks at the way Michigan treats juveniles found guilty of first-degree murder. It is grim reading.

As noted in the introduction:

To date, 376 young people have been sentenced to life without the possibility of parole in Michigan. Only one other state has more.

Michigan (358), New York (475), Florida (355), California (301) and Louisiana (238) at one point accounted for two-thirds of all children imprisoned in the United States, according to the report.

What’s infuriating is that treating children as young as 14 in this manner is clearly irrational, and morally indefensible.

There is good reason why the law mandates someone has to be 18 before they are allowed to  vote or sit on a jury or sign a contract. And there’s also good reason why no other country in the world puts juveniles behind bars for life without the possibility of parole. Again, from the report:

Contemporary neurological science confirms the cognitive differences between a child and an adult. An examination of the human brain demonstrates the undeveloped frontal lobe in adolescence compared to adults. This is the area of the brain that is associated with impulse control, planning, risk  evaluation, and comprehending consequences. Scientific research confirms that the part of the brain which allows for mature decision making in not yet fully developed in teenagers.

It  is not that children fail to recognize right from wrong. Instead, it is this cognitive underdevelopment of the brain, coupled with an inability to appropriately respond to peer pressure, adult persuasion, and lack of control over their environment, that increases the risk of impulsive and dangerous activity among youth.

So, if it makes sense that a kid must wait until the age of 18 to vote, how can anyone justify sentencing a 14 year old to prison for life without the possibility of parole?

Part of the problem is that judges are prohibited from exercising digression.

As noted by Kimberly Thomas, a University of Michigan Law School professor:

The most sympathetic 15-year-old accomplice to a felony-murder and the most sociopathic adult serial killer will receive the same sentence,  without any judicial ability to take stock of the difference between the two for sentencing purposes.

One-third of youth currently serving life without parole sentences in Michigan did not themselves commit a homicide but instead were convicted for their lesser involvement as tagalongs,  lookouts, or  for following the orders  of adult co-defendants.

And then there’s the truly heartbreaking part: photos and stories of kids who will spend the rest of their lives in prison unless change occurs.

Stories like that of Nicole Dupure, who was 17 when her 19-year-old boyfriend robbed and killed an elderly Macomb County woman while Dupure sat in a restaurant next door. Looking to cut a plea deal, the boyfriend implicated her. She maintains she had no involvement in the crime, but will spend her life behind bars while the boyfriend, who was allowed to plead to a second-degree murder charge, will be eligible for release before he turns 40.

The principal author of the report is Ann Arbor attorney Deborah LaBelle, director of the Juvenile Life Without Parole Initiative.

I met some very hip writers Kabul filmmakers, painters and musicians at the Afghan Cultural House (the MOCAD of Kabul) http://ach.af/. I performed a few poems for them, which they said, “We like! We Like!” I did some “Blood in the Moon” (they seem very biggly on both blood and the moon over here). We talked Afghan poetry, fiction, artwork and music. I told those established writers in the audience that I sincerely believed there would be a market for their work in America where there is a serious lack of literature and art from a country we have been involved intensely with for nearly 12 years. They seemed encouraged. I gave them some of my CDs for themselves and the art club’s library. Before I left, a young Afghan woman artist showed me here paintings on slides on her iPHONE. They were very impressive, advanced and colorful with pieces of human hair inserted into the art. She asked me to collaborate by putting some of my new poems to her paintings. She said she created her work as a statement on behalf of women’s liberation for the women of Afghanistan. This is very brave to do over here where women are treated as second class (or less) citizens. I told her we would collaborate, and I thought I could get the book published over here in the US. I am awaiting the files of her paintings to start my poems.

Friday is their Sunday over here. It was, also, my day off to get some R&R. The Cultural Affairs Officer, a very cool dude and major Rolling Stones fan, took me to the weekly Friday bazaar on a military compound. I found some less than legit DVD’s, bought several Pashtu hats (I’m modeling one in the photo), cool Afghan scarves, and I picked my band mate and poetry partner Faruq Z. Bey up some genuine amber prayers beads and a cool new Muslim lid that I am sure he’ll sport the next time you see him playing in Motown. I watched the Embassy softball team play in a field on the other compound (the Tigers have been on The Armed Forces Network every morning here live from the West Coast-O Yea!), and I headed home to fully relax because the next day we were heading to  Kandahar. The trip to the gig consisted of a Department of State small jet, a Chinook Helicopter ride, and a four tank / MRAP convoy to an undisclosed location in Kandahar to meet 30 plus local poets who were the primo poets on the Kandahar po-scene. We had a wonderful two hour session reading our poems to each other and discussing the importance of poetry in Afghan and American societies. I told them all about the hip scene we have in Detroit. One poet dude looked like Smokey Robinson. He never heard of Motown, so I sang a course of “Being With You.” I can tell you all that poetry is really important here. I performed my spiritual piece “Deliver Me” with the Coltrane’s “Love Supreme” riff, and they went bonkers because religion is huge here, and I was displaying my faith in God/Allah. I taught them to click their fingers after poems and say “dig that!” They was much clicking and digging after that one. Then the head of the organization stood up and said in Pashtu: “Your visit here today is more important than 500, 000 US soldiers in Afghanistan.” Needless to say, I was moved very deeply when I heard the translation. I told them that we were all meant to meet in that location on that day long before we were all born, and that Saturday we were fulfilling our destinies. After the gig, we were hustled out to the tanks by a team of fantastic Army staff heavily armed and ready for anything that might happen. They circled us, walked us into the tanks, and we drove back to the base. Does stuff like this really happen to a working class kid from Motown? Hard for me to believe still.

I traveled out to Orange Blossom country in beautiful Jalalabad in Nangarhar Province. Jalalabad is a stone’s through from the famous Kyber Pass which is the gateway to Pakistan. We helicoptered in from Kabul passing over the beautiful snow capped peaks of the southern slopes of the Hindu Kush mountains heading east to Nangarhar. We landed at a military base that was once a Soviet R&R spot and later (rumor has it) a Taliban retreat where Osama Bin Laden and his posse once stayed. Nobody knows if this is 100% true, but it certainly looks old school Soviet housing to me, as I have stayed in my share of old Soviet style hotels in Mother Russia. We were near the famous Tora Bora Mountain caves where Bin was allegedly hiding and where he was when Dubya famously and stupidly said “I don’t know where he is. Frankly, I don’t spend a lot 0f time thinking bout him anymore.” This was months after 9/11.
My roommate and host was a Detroit native and Wayne State University Urban Studies and Planning Masters graduate and USAID State Dept. worker from Plymouth, Michigan. His parents are still there, and he gets home every so often. When he attended WSU, he lived in a loft down on the river. He actually told me that out of all his degrees from UM, etc.-the WSU M.A. has been the most valuable in his work in Afghanistan. Go Warriors!!!!
Anyway, he showed me around the compound and pointed out the dusty, empty swimming pool where the “urban legend” (Hey Now-Jalalabad’s a big ass city in these here parts!) is that the Taliban executed people there. It now has a basketball hoop with a hand painted 3 point line around it. I think the Taliban executed in the deep end—in more ways than one.
I was given three assignments in Jalalabad. First,I did a workshop with 30 English Access Micro-scholarship students from the area and their teachers. Access is a U.S. government-sponsored English-language training program administered around the world is to make the study of English more accessible to students and teachers. I have visited several of these programs not only here, but in Israel and the West Bank  over the years. I turned the workshop into a lesson and poetry writing session based upon William Carlos Williams short poems. The students were all Pasthtu school kids who were very reserved and very polite. I knew I had to quickly change the scene. Five minutes into our two hour session, as is typical, the electric generator went out and left us with no A/C or lights. We were in what they call a container without windows, and it was over 90 degrees and sunny outside. Oy! Oy! Oy! After I had the kids write their poems on big white sheets of paper that we hung all around the room, I had them get up and rap the poems to the instrumental music of Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” and B.I.G.’s “Juicy.” They had never heard of hip-hop music-ever, but they liked it immensely. The look in their eyes must have been similar to my own when I first heard The Beatles. They were excited. I told them to jump around and “free form” words with the music. They did. They like! They like! It was one of the coolest overseas educational experiences I have ever had.

The next day I was going to first meet with college students and professors from Nangarhar University. To get there, we had to suit up in full body armor and load into MRAPS-essentially Humvees on steroids built to withstand roadside bombs, bullets, grenades, etc. It took four of these things to get me to the location in downtown Jalalabad. Two led the way, I was in the third tank and a fourth backed us up. Once we arrived, we had to exit and stand in the middle with flak jackets of several heavily armed soldiers as they walked us to the lecture hall. I want to say to all these men  are extremely talented, well trained and some of the most dedicated people I have ever met. Seeing them in action here makes me feel both proud and very safe. I know people say crap like that all the time, but I am telling you the truth. I have seen them work up close and personal, and they saved my life every minute of every day I was in Afghanistan.
Anyway, the students and professors wanted to talk Contemporary American poetry, so I walked them through Dickinson, Whitman, Williams, Hughes and some Ginsberg. The discussion was full and meaningful. I perfed a couple of pieces for them, and they seemed to like the ML music-po thing quite a bit too. Who knew? We had a super great session followed by a traditional Afghan lunch (they gots some pita over here). After lunch, I met with a wide variety of Pashtu poets, and we talked and they read their poems. We talked about the importance of poetry in our lives, the community and the world.
On Thursday, we coptered back down to Kabul for a meeting at The Afghan Cultural House. More on that cool meeting in the next Blog.

After that we headed to the Afghanistan National Institute of Music   in another part of town by Kabul University. I guess this would be the “Fame High School” or Glee of Kabul. These were amazing kids of all levels of English who were also music students. I had them break out their unique instruments with some traditional instruments, and I got them jamming a funky beat to set the mood. After that, I performed a one of my pieces live (“In a Window>Sinclair’s “The Screamers”), so they could follow where I wanted them to go. Then, we had a full discussion of Langston Hughes “A Dream Deferred” poem to get them use to concrete and abstract language in poetry. After that, I got them to write their own repetition style poems using a start for each line with “I Have a Dream….” Next we got everyone up solo and as teams to perf their poems with the music rocking in the background. The class was seriously rockin, and a lot of other students gathered outside the door to see sup with the goateed bald dude rockin the poetry class. I got a little video I’ll try to put up.

Tomorrow off for more high school students to discuss William Carlos Williams short poems and get them to write a little. I will have to file a report on Monday and Tuesday-Wednesday’s activities when I return from Jalalabad in the north. We can’t take any electronic devices with us as we have to get up there by helicopter and visit the university via army tanks with armed escorts. I’ll let ya know how your homey does with all of this. We ain’t in Kansas, or Motown, anymore Dorothy.

I will leave you with a poem inspired by The Afghan Women’s Writers Project written by Brighton poet and friend Christine Rhein (who will be featured at the May version of Detroit Tonight Live at The Jazz Café at Music Hall on Thursday May 24th at 7:00pm and don’t forget to get tickets for my pal Al Kooper’s rare Jazz Café Show Thursday May 17th-I’ll host my brother back in the D. http://jazzcafedetroit.com).

Folks Check Out

“Sparrow’s, Poet’s Deaths” by Christine Rhein in its original format at this link below. It is a powerful poem.

http://qarrtsiluni.com/2010/10/01/sparrows-poets-deaths/

The flight pattern into Dubai was a bit surreal as we flew right down through the heart of the Middle East . At one point I noticed on the plane’s map that Baghdad was on my right and Tehran on my left with the once fought over Kuwait straight away. We flew in over The Persian Gulf and landed smoothly in Dubai. My flight to Kabul was quite late at 3:30am. After a Costa Coffee in the fancy schmancy Disney World mall-airport, I boarded my flight to Kabul.  Traveling over the snow capped mountains of southern Afghanistan, “Lose Yourself” came on my iPod. It felt right to have a little Em with me from the D landing in the K.

I arrived in the capital city about 6:30am Saturday May 5th local time (Afghanistan is 8 ½ hour ahead of Detroit). After waiting for luggage in an airport about the size of Cheyenne, WY, I was met by a State Department Assistant Cultural Affairs Officer. As we drove from the airport to the Embassy Compound, the streets were packed with cars, tanks, jeeps, soldiers, and people heading to work on their first day of the week, and some of us thought Saturdays were for running around to used CD stores. Everything looked like a typical city until I glanced out the armored car’s window to see a man riding shotgun in a donkey  cart down the middle of Massoud Road (their Woodward-only it’s the width of the alley we use for our annual Dally).

At the Embassy, I was taken to my hooch to sleep. Before dozing off, I noticed my first cultural stop tomorrow on the tour is with the Afghan Women’s Writers Project that novelist Masha Hamilton started around 2009. I’ll spend several hours with them writing, talking and growing as writers. I’ll give a full report after. I notice my Detroit poet friend Suzanne Scarfone has spent some online time working with this legendary group of women writers. Check out their website and get to know these very brave women who have discovered that writing can save  lives and change the world for the better. http://awwproject.org/

Clarke has introduced a bill calling for forgiving of “up to $45,520 in student debt after a borrower makes ten years of payments at 10 percent of income.”

As the lefty magazine reports, student debt is crippling — not just for the young people directly burdened by it, but also to America’s ability to remain competitive:

“The student loan crisis has had two effects. The United States, once the leader in the percentage of college graduates age 25 to 34, has dropped to 16th among 36 developed nations, with more and more students dropping out because they can’t afford the rising costs. The second effect is ruinous debt: the average indebted college graduate is $25,000 in hock. Total student debt exceeds $1 trillion — now greater than credit card debt. And student debt is inescapable. Bankruptcy rarely extinguishes it; even Social Security payments can be garnished in case of delinquency.”

But the question of what to do about debt that’s already been incurred isn’t the only matter that needs to be addressed. The editors rightly argue that, for America to prosper, higher education has to again become more easily accessible.

“Making public college (or advanced training) free for those who merit it isn’t a radical idea. For many years the United States led the world in free K–12 education. The GI Bill paid for college or advanced training for a generation of vets after World War II, which gave us the best-educated citizenry in the world and broadened the middle class. As recently as 1980, Pell grants covered 69 percent of public college costs; now they cover less than 35 percent.”

Providing free college educations would cost an estimated $30 billion annually. Among the many benefits of that, the magazine argues, would be “a better-educated citizenry, and young people could be more entrepreneurial and more public-spirited.” There are also ways to pay for it. The Nation suggests instituting a small tax on all Wall Street financial transactions. Such a tax, it is pointed out, “would raise many times” that $30 billion sum.

The problem is that “Washington is too paralyzed by the elite fixation on austerity and too polarized by partisan divides to consider anything this bold.”

As a result, it is argued, reform will only come through outside pressure from students, their parents and those able to see the obvious wisdom in lowering barriers to higher education.