THE VENT 2.0 (prologue)

Vent - to give vigorous or emotional expression to an opportunity, or way of escape, or passage, or relief of pressure, to cause fresh air to circulate so as to replace foul air.

Welcome to the second installment of THE VENT with operation systems powered up at 2.0. THE VENT is a subterranean medium in prisoner zine format. This is a WRITE OR DIE ZINE PRODUCTION written, produced, and now distributed by a new generation of California death row population, known as The Papyrus Collective.

With controversial rap lyrics, spoken word works, and introspective reviews, THE VENT provides the intentional use of dialect and slang, which solidification the transformative power to engage the freedom of speech and artistic freedom of expression without compromising urban culture thought to be exposed to a diluted, forbidden translation.

They say that there is power in words, so we power up this issue by challenging everybody who enters THE VENT to create a catharsis tonight by including words "GOD" and/or "SATAN" in their contribution to this cipher.

In the last election, California voters voted to speed up the execution process, a recent court ruling on behalf of the voters, and Prop 66 became law in the state. The irony is that death row's population is growing younger and younger, and with the rise of inner city youth being executed on the streets by militarized police officers, we became interested in questioning the concept of God inside of THE VENT from the perspective of condemned youth, a few honorable California prison mailine inmates, and a few O.G.E.

Welcome to THE VENT 2.0.

Sniper Azande Xzyzst
Master of Ceremonies

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THE VENT 2.0 Bleeding Heart
Good looking out, brotha. I received my copy of THE VENT and I'm impressed by the outcome. I give a big heads up to everybody's contributions. Y'all did good, brotha, real good. Perfectly titled, THE VENT.

As I read it, my mind was elevated and I was allowed to enter everybody's personal space. I felt what they felt, I saw what they saw. THE VENT reads like an experience, a moving experience, and for that reason, I'm compelled to thank you for allowing me to be a part of such an experience.

I just turned my peoples onto the addressed blog site. I don't know much about blogging, but nevertheless, I've turned my peoples onto it. Get some more eyes and ears paying attention to the situation.

The different styles of communication showed major creativity; "TALK INTO THE BULLET HOLE", metaphorically speaking, spoke volumes to the efforts mentioned. The back and forth dialogue raised my eyebrows. "PRESS SEND" took me back to moments when I would be nurturing my loved ones on the streets by way of written word (texting) instead of a verbal convo or talking on the phone, taking advantage of being able to say all that you feel. You need to, in order to stress your point of view, press send.

And with "THE ROOT OF THE MATTER" and the expression of "ISMS" to the tree of life, I was able to co-relate that with my own metaphors for the tree of life or even my family tree.

But I think the most poignant for me personally was "NARMIR'S LETTER" (Raw). The way the brotha expressed how his thoughts "evil, white, and plain" from the loss of his niece, that hit me because I'm one of those brothas who pray a lot as well, and the expression of the inability to prostrate because of this new void growing in his spirit, moved me.

I was equally moved by the response of "SPEARS & SHIELDS" to a fellow struggling brotha, in terms of dealing with tragedy. Invaluable experiences. You know, for us, this is commonplace. We have parallels in these experiences of tragedy. Death and destruction feast upon our breed. But for the world outside, to crack open our chest plates and expose the power source to our misinterpreted emotions, is an experience worth the price of admission.

As I turned the pages, I could hear the bending and breaking, the snapping and cracking of each man's inner will, erect itself to a height that overshadows our circumstances with a depth of substance by way of raw emotion and creative genes. I hear all of these brothas in THE VENT right now, venting frustrations, solving problems the world around, uplifting God and denouncing Satan, balancing mental competence with insanity, sharpening evil, falling in love with pen pals, admiring milestones and achievements of those close to heart, exercising that hate the brotha spoke of, treading water in an ocean of misery, deciding to live through these incomprehensible circumstances, educating the minds that had their growth purposefully stunted, awakening a love, for kin and kind.

I can hear them breaking, "We, in THE VENT ALL DAY," "We in THE VENT right now," taking on a great responsibility working loose that filter from our perception—or how the world has been led to perceive a condemned man. They think we are all a bunch of hallucinogenic Charles Mansons or Grim Sleepers, so that society doesn't realize that the majority of the criminal element (or those convicted of crimes housed on death row) are the less fortunate who have felt the greatest psychological effect of the evil it took to build this great nation that we inhabit.

From the near extermination of the Native Americans, to the enslavement of the African man, woman, and child, we are the seeds of those loins that the Willie Lynch Letters prophesied "would be broken for generations yet to come." This is the psychological effect of oppression that, along with Stockholm Syndrome, have only caused our brothas to identify with our oppressor. Brothas have begun to mimic their oppressors. Now brothas have been brought so low that they justify the methods of oppression as being not only tolerable but acceptable in association with monetary gain.

The average man on this row is the subject of all those "ISMs" that the brotha listed, turned inward, attempting to write in the confines of our ghettos, only to be stagnated in great numbers.

See, the sick puppies are sick puppies. Ain't nothing we can do about that. We can't put a man back inside the womb and rewire him. The elements that damaged the proverbial sick puppy are beyond our explanation, and those are questions to be answered by scientists and psychologists.

The elements that brought the black man to his knees are elements we all can identify with (racism, white supremacy), and the problems that are depleting our ghettos of its soldiers can be directly attributed to that specific mental illness. It's funny how they can diagnose everything else except white supremacy as a mental illness that it is.

Just thinking about this metaphorically got me in THE VENT right now. Keep on doing what you are doing, bro. My mind and my heart are always here for you. I'll dip my pen in the ink of my blood any time you need the world to hear my heart bled. Suwhoop business.

Respectfully, forever so strong, I shall always remain.

—Negasi Kamara (Squabbles)