In Luis Rodriguez Book, “Always Running”, readers will learn about the author’s early life and the things he has gone through. He talks about dealing with problems that his family and the people around them had. They dealt with poverty and with the education system that never worked. He also talks about the violence that happened around him as a result of the things that they were going through. It seemed that it would be impossible for him to escape his reality until he found something to use to get away from the violence in his life. For Rodriguez and for many others going through this struggle their way of getting out of it was poetry.  

Poetry is one way for someone to express their feelings to the world. Finding a way to express our feelings is an important thing for everyone to do because if we don’t we we have keep those feelings to ourselves. This is something that is especially important when you are raised somewhere where it is seen as cowardly if you do feel sad.This was true for Luis Rodriguez and many others like him. Poetry is a way to let out all the emotion and frustration that you have. For youths in L.A their frustration comes from the combination of poverty, discrimination, and bad education that they have to deal with.

 

Former gang members speak out through poetry

Poetry has become recognized as a positive way to move forward in your life. The link above shows a video of former gang members using poetry as a way to share their feelings and experiences based on the harsh childhood they had.

 

You can see that poetry has really changed their lives in a positive way. Sharing you emotions is important for everyone but it is also important for someone to listen. That is why it is important to read books and poetry like “Always Running”. Doing this is the only way to understand someone completely even if you haven’t gone through what they have. Once we understand that person we can begin finding ways to help them.

 

Always Running: la vida loca: Gang Days in L.A.

Gang related activities happen to often than they should have. Surrounding oneself with bad influences and growing up in poverty friends of friends start to understand each other on a deeper level and eventually fall into a brotherhood for life AKA a gang. It is not fun to witness people grow up into something that they never wanted there future to be but yet got comfortable with the lifestyle while knowing if they left it would be betrayal for the friends that will always have your back.

Personally witnessing people from my bloodline entering a gang is an unforgettable experience.  I was a little boy always taking risks that would get me in trouble. Although I knew it was wrong, it was exciting to me. After a while my biological father started to realize who I was becoming, him. He decided to take initiative and teach me the right path that wasn’t the gang lifestyle. The stories that they would tell and the hardships they went through were remarkable, given he wanted the best future for me, his stories from his friends, fights, and the time he spent in Juvenal hall always had my interest. As hard as the gang life is he got “out” because of financial issues he had to move away from everything including me. Now, me trying to do better I will always remember one thing he told me, don’t give up.