My longtime, very dear friend, Bob Shacochis, is a truth-teller, and an immaculate one.

For the many years I’ve known him, I’ve read nearly every word he’s written. And for many years, he’s been one of our country’s greatest novelists, short story writers, and journalists. He’s broken ground in all three genres. Bob always raises high the bar. He keeps it high. He’s been working nearly nine years on a new novel.

As we hear reports from Haiti, it should not be lost on anyone that Bob Shacochis has been an American journalist once embedded deeply in Haiti. He wrote a seminal and award-winning book on Haiti, The Immaculate Invasion.  Get it.  Now.  You want to know more about Haiti before the earthquake?  Sure, there are histories.  Sure, novelist Madison Smartt Bell has written a wonderful trilogy of books on Haiti, and he’s worth reading.

Haitian-American novelist - and one of my favorite writers - Edwidge Danticat has written profoundly about her country in stories, novels, and creative nonfiction.  Read her.

But, I tend to always go to my friend Bob.  I knew that soon enough he’d weigh in on the quake and it’s aftermath.  Here’s a piece he wrote for The Daily Beast.  Real perspective.  For instance, we see former president Clinton now, awash in what Caribbean light there is in Haiti.  However, Bob was in Haiti when the country essentially crumbled in 1994.  His take on Clinton’s 1994 - 1996 game plan, in conjunction with our U.S. Special Forces, casts a new light on the current situation. 

I think that Bob thinks there’s certainly hope for Haiti (he loves the Haitian people way too much to be overly skeptical); however, I also believe he’s watching the humanitarian groundswell very closely. President Clinton’s interests and activities are not far off Bob’s radar.  

He’s written extensively on Haiti for Harper’s Magazine, especially.  Find those back issues with his pieces: they’re possibly the best reporting on and from the country that we have in the last 15 - 20 years.  Again, sure, Haiti’s covered journalistically.  There are probably 2,000 - 3,000 journalists there now, given those arriving from around the world. Yet, you want some of the best.  Right, I’ve learned a lot from my friend, and I’m encouraging you to learn, too.

The literary radio program from Santa Monica, California, Bookworm, interviewed him years ago.  I also encourage you to listen to Bob talk about writing, about his art.

Haiti media coverage, and the apocalyptic fanfare that accompanies it, will be extensive and ongoing for years. Bob Shacochis is one of our (real) veteran journalists and literary artists whose past and future coverage you do not want to miss. No fanfare. Just the truth. That’s the word.

It may be 2010, but the year 2006 was an important year for a group of artists and poets.

These 38 artists and 44 poets in 2006 contributed work to a vibrant and provocative poetry anthology, For a Better World. In fact, the anthology became an annual work beginning in 2004, celebrating themes of peace and justice, inclusion and tolerance, understanding, hope, change, faith, and transformation.

Each year since 2004, the poetry-art anthology - the brilliant creation of publisher and artist Saad Ghosn - has become an open invitation to artists and poets particular in southern Ohio to capitalize on this avenue for their work. The results have been breathtakingly passionate and experimental. The content always surprises in the way it elevates new voices, while showcasing some of the region’s veteran artists and writers.

Now, poems and drawings from the 2006 anthology are on display at the Kennedy Heights Arts Center. The exhibition runs from January 16 - February 27. It is called, “For a Better World 2006: Artists and Poets Reflecting on Peace and Justice. The Arts Center, established in 2003, deserves tremendous praise for finding a new way to illuminate these works.

The gallery hours are Monday through Friday 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Saturdays 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

I will be moderating a panel discussion on Saturday, February 27, from 4:00 - 6:00 p.m. The panel, entitled “Art as a Vehicle for Change,” will consist of writer and literary advocate Mary Pierce Brosner (founder of Women Writing for (a) Change); writer and editor Gregory Flannery (Streevibes); and visual artist Jimi Jones. These powerful writers and artists are friends and longtime co-advocates of empowering people to understand the impact of written and spoken words and the urgency of art.

The Kennedy Heights Art Center, in collaboration with Saad Ghosn, proves yet again that their community-building mission knows no limits in ingenuity and in their greater calling to champion the best art in this region.

Steve Kissing came to me four years ago with a poem. I gave him a short critique. I loved the poem, although I had no idea he had a penchant for poetry. That was a twist. “I’ve been dabbling,” he said.

Steve had just published a new extraordinary memoir, Running from the Devil: A Memoir of a Boy Possessed, which captures a period of time during his youth in which he suspected he might be possessed. It turned out that Steve was simply the recipient of an uproarious adolescence and wildly provocative imagination. The memoir is brilliant and one of the must-reads on anyone’s list of autobiographical reading.

With Running…, Steve even wound up on The Diane Rehm Show, out of Washington D.C., a national radio show, huge audience, glued listeners, an automatic, plug-in to, say, a couple hundred thousand listeners. What occurred: a spike in book sales. A kind of blessing. The book was already selling.

In fact, outside of Mary Karr’s and Tobias Wolff’s works, Steve Kissing’s only memoir should be near the top. Otherwise, his imagination never stops. Is it a surprise he’s Creative Director of Barefoot Proximity, in Cincinnati, a superbly successful marketing/graphics/branding firm? Is it a surprise he’s a columnist for Cincinnati Magazine?

No surprise. Steve is not just one of my favorite writers; he’s a writer that matters. Sure, he’s one of the funniest friends I know and has one of the most generous spirits. Yet his range of writing continues to thrill and to exert itself.

His first book of poems, a chapbook, is Survival of the Fittest: Poems about Camping and Hiking. A slim book, it is still a must read. It’s Steve’s initiation into the world of poetry book publishing. It’s available through www.amazon.com and www.BigTablePublishing.com.

The poems - 26 in the collection - range from mediations on the episodic craziness of “Family Camping” to prose poems to skillful handling of forms such as couplets (”Love is Natural” and “Escapees”) and a totally original take on raccoons, the skitterish bandits: “…these junk food junkies/Return to their dens and slip into a food and drink/Coma, just as we are emerging from our own….”

Perfectly rendered. Nothing escapes this nature-lover’s eye. His eye for particulars is keen. He knows the smells of the woods and the ineptness of litter bugs.

In Cincinnati, Ohio, Steve will give a reading of some of the poems at Joseph Beth Booksellers on Thursday, January 21 at 7:00 p.m. Pencil in that date. He is a superb reader; it will be more than entertaining.

His bio even touches on what we can expect in the future: “His favorite place to camp is Yellowstone and his favorite place to hike is in his own mind.”

I’m awaiting more results in book form from Steve’s mind-trips.

I’m just coming down from the emotional intensity surrounding the Mass of Christian Burial for my friend and colleague, Father Mark Schmieder. It was held at St. Francis Seraph church in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio. It will not soon be forgotten.

Neither will Fr. Mark. As Father Bob, officiating the service, expressed in his remembrance, ”Mark wanted to have a funeral among the poor.”

This mostly says it all about Fr. Mark Schmieder and his M.O.  My colleague on our county’s jail chaplaincy team put Fr. Mark into an even greater perspective. Bob said to me on New Year’s Eve: “Mark was a trench worker. Sometimes it took you awhile to remember that he was a priest.”

He was on this earth for 69 years, and so many of those years were spent in vigorous service to helping the disenfranchised, the “marginal” as another acquaintance of mine put it. Fr. Mark considered impoverished people - homeless, addicts, broken emotionally and spiritually - marginal. He never judged them.

The year 2009 was nightmarish for Fr. Mark, especially when he learned he had pancreatic cancer, and yet the year was a blessing to him in a myriad of ways that perhaps only Fr. Mark could recognize.

Quan Truong, a wonderfully insightful reporter, wrote an outstanding profile of Fr. Mark in The Cincinnati Enquirer in which he illuminates some of those blessings. Quan hit so many things right about Fr. Mark. When reading it, pay special attention to Kairos.

Fr. Mark Schmieder was the innovator - the mind and heart - behind the launching of Kairos in Ohio’s prison system. This was no small task. It took years of planning and implementing. I attended a Kairos graduation last year at Warren Correctional Institution, and to this day I cannot forget the immense feeling of joy I received being among those inmate-believers whose remarks about their transformation and new positive thinking remain fixed in my mind.

To think that the joy I received in just being at Warren for Kairos had an indisputable direct tie to my colleague, Fr. Mark.

Fr. Mark was a do-er. I cannot fathom the number of people whose lives Fr. Mark influenced, although I have a clue: St. Francis Seraph church was so crowded January 2 that guests stood rows-deep all the way back to the door of the church. Standing Room Only: an understatement.

Fr. Mark was also instrumental in originating and expanding The St. Francis-St. Joseph Catholic Worker House (Hamilton County). The House’s website has a tribute to Fr. Mark. Please visit it. The House derives from the tireless Catholic Worker Movement spearheaded by Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin in 1933. Fr. Mark: a true spiritual descendant of Dorothy Day, Mother Teresa, and St. Francis of Assisi.

Fr. Bob eloquently spoke of Fr. Mark’s passion for the marginal, his extraordinary genius for leadership and servitude, his robust humor, his wisdom and savvy, and his humility. Fr. Mark got things done. He may have been late for meetings or events, but things got done. 

Much got accomplished, and people that Fr. Mark ministered to often embraced new life changes because he overstepped fear and derision. He claimed once that “people live in a culture of fear, and that’s why things don’t change.” 

What mattered to Fr. Mark Schmieder came down to this remark: “Nobody is a nobody in God’s eyes.”

I appreciated hearing from my friend and colleague, Bill Miley, who illuminated several key observations on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that are very important to point out, as Bill responds to my recent blog of December 1.

Bill writes cogently, and I’d like to share his insights, which are indeed worthy to note. Bill writes:

“In 2005, the Israeli government made an unprecedented move to unilaterally withdraw citizens from Gaza. The plan, under Ariel Sharon’s Kadima party, was called “disengagement.” Thousands of Israeli citizens were forcibly displaced from their homes and businesses.

“The result was that in 2006 the Palestinians elected Hamas - a terrorist organization and proxy of Iran as the legal government in Gaza. Subsequently, the agricultural businesses that grow fruit and vegetables for export to the rest of Israel and internationally that were formally owned by Israelis have been allowed to decay. Instead, Hamas has been smuggling rockets into Gaza to be fired into Israel.

“Rocket fire was nearly continuous even after the so-called ‘ceasefire’. Almost none of that was reported in the U.S. press. Finally, after several warnings from Israel, the Israeli government took action and started the Operation Cast Lead to stop the rocket fire. Even so, the IDF took extraordinary measures to keep Palestinians from getting hurt. They sent thousands of text messages directly to Palestinians to warn them of impending action against missile sites, most of which were hidden in civilian neighborhoods and schools. Even so, Israel has been vilified in the press for its actions in Gaza.

“Take a look at the following video by Arab-American Brigitte Gabriel on her view of Israel and Islam:

“Other resources that I recommend to get the Israeli perspective:

“1) Caroline Glick - her book, Shackled Warrior. It is an insightful look into the Middle East situation. She is my favorite commentator on the subject;

“2) Walid Shoebat - another former Muslim who supports Israel and speaks out against radical Islam;

“3) Noni Darwish - an Egyptian Arab who warns against the Sharia Law;

“4) Bat Yeor - a Jewish woman originally from Egypt, hence her pseudonym “daughter of the river.” Her book “Eurabia” - The Euro-Arab Axis.

“Lest you think that I am not sympathetic with the Palestinians, I believe that they have been victimized by their own leadership, rather than Israel. Hamas has not bettered the lives of the Gazans since coming to power. There are ministries directly to the Arab Palestinians such as ‘Hope for Ishmael’ - which I support.

“Not everything Israel does is right. But, the Bible commands us to pray for Israel. Israel is all the stands between us and the rising tide of militant Islam. As believers, we need to be aware of what the truth is and what is at stake for our own country.

“Finally, one more good video to watch. Netanyahu’s speech before the United Nations.”

Today, I’m reflecting on a recent roundtable discussion in which I participated. It was held at the Peaselee Neighborhood Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, and it dealt with peace and justice issues involving Palestine.

I was especially moved by the intelligence and fervor exhibited by three students representing the substantial, national activist Students for Justice in Palestine. They spoke at length about their recent visits to Palestine and their concern for the injustices they’ve observed being leveled by Israel against Palestinians.

See RED!’s slide show of the roundtable and the video of Nancy Paraskevopoulos talking passionately about her visit and especially Shuva Street.

The students’ calm articulation of incursions against the Palestinian people captured a series of intense depictions of poverty, isolation, and struggle. I’m still thinking about some of the intense activity Nancy described that has taken place on Shuva Street - in one of the oldest neighborhoods in Palestine.

In this part of Hebron, for example, Nancy met with “Youth Against Settlements” whose members gave her a tour of the area. It was dangerous, she said. “I have never seen poverty like this,” she said.

Shuva Street, which is in the “old City” of Hebron, has had its economy and commerce effectively destroyed, as a result of the Israeli occupation and settlements. “You don’t feel safe here,” said Drew Gobel, of Students for Justice in Palestine. “There are people with guns all over.”

While visiting Shuva Street, Drew asked a Palestinian, “What do you do to resist the Israeli occupation?” The man told Drew, ”We stay in our homes.”

At the same time, in Nancy’s conversations with families, she realized that one of the Palestinians’ sentiments was a desire for their families to group up safely - without conflict. “They were clinging to a belief that their children would see hope and safety and even peace,” Nancy told the guests at Peaselee.

Paul Erb, also of Students for Justice in Palestine, along with Drew, presented a condensed yet vivid history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It was a necessary recap. And very clear. 

It was punctuated by Drew’s assuring the group that recent hopeful developments do exist in that part of the Middle East, in spite of the Israeli government’s hard-line stance: the Obama Administration is pressuring Israel to stop building settlements inside the West Bank. It’s also sending envoys, even while the Israeli government, for now, refuses to stop building new settlements. The U.S. subsidizes much of the facilitation of the building of these settlements, which has presented its own concern to President Obama.

Students for Justice in Palestine is visibly growing in its international outreach. It is on the move. These students care and their convictions are bold. We should all care.   

I am proud of my friend and RED!’s senior technical advisor, William Lambers.

Bill exudes a charisma and proactive vision that have helped identify RED!’s recent achievements as a major publication.

He is also his own man in the world of writing, publishing, and outreach. His prolific work bangs the drum of a number of cultural and political issues, namely those involving world peace, nuclear disarmament, and fighting global hunger.

Bill Lambers is on the frontline.

He’s published a new book, The Roadmap to End Global Hunger, which is a must-read for not only his illustrating the bold, under-the-radar approaches the U.S. government is taking toward combating world hunger, but for the unsubtle and articulate way Bill addresses one of the current worst epidemics in world history.

Read this notice about the new book.  Also, here’s a new op-ed piece that showcases Bill’s other concern for peace and justice. His humanitarian push is gaining much ground. His readership grows weekly.

While you’re checking out his other books or his website, know that all of Bill’s works are incredibly reasonably priced. He wants you to read.

But, about global hunger: the stats are blindingly chilling. The stories should make you furious enough to get involved, even in a marginal way. Little by little.

RED! supports Bill’s efforts - and those of the U.N. World Food Programme - to fight the fight against world poverty. In so many cases where hunger exists, especially in third world countries, families that depend on a father’s or husband’s presence are left deprived often because the adult male in the home is incarcerated. This is certainly a reality and usually not talked about in the media.

We salute you, Bill. Let’s keep spreading the word. We’ve just started.

My friend, west coast documentary filmmaker, Doug Harris, has geared up for a very special day.

Today, the many fruits of his tireless work these past many years to craft his new documentary film will be shared in the screening of a significant, 13-minute portion of his major (soon-to-be-completed) film, “Basketball Guru: The Pete Newell Story.” Guru will be screened at the Landmark Theater in downtown Berkeley.

Oakland Tribune columnist Carl Steward has just written a wonderful piece on Doug and the film’s reach.

Doug, in his humble way, brushes me off when I introduced him to my friends as “one of the elite documentary filmmakers in the country - any genre.” He is. It’s unquestionble now, with the advent of the whole Pete Newell film.

On the road these past two months compiling his final takes and interviews, he’s met up with Bill Walton, Pat Riley, Oscar Robertson, Adrian Smith, Wayne Embrey, and a plethora of others. Pete Newell influenced each of these celebrated players and coaches in major ways. 

I had a blast tooling around with Doug when he came to stay six weeks ago with me in Cincinnati, while knocking out prestigious interviews with Wayne Embrey (in Milwaukee), the Big O. and “Odie” Smith. He made a big splash out here and he’ll be back. He and I know that.

Pete Newell’s impact on people, players, and coaches is immeasurable. Check out the youtube sequence Doug has put up. It spans three generations. Newell is still talked about as if he’s going to show up any minute and share some wisdom. Doug’s film will catapult Newell’s legacy like no other work on him to date. The excerpt screened today in Berkeley should be a barometer of a forthcoming milestone.

The world has lost a true warrior and kindred spirit of hope, dignity, and transformation.

Robin ‘Doc’ Herman passed away Wednesday evening in a Dayton, Ohio hospice after a battle with cancer. One should know, right off, that his spirit of peacefulness still contained a resevoir of fight against such a disease. But, Doc is at peace now. One of our spiritual lights has burned out, although Doc’s undying, well-lit imprint will remain in our hearts and minds.

His constancy, his advocacy, his teaching, and his wisdom will always be cherished.

Doc was a friend and a colleague, a distinguished professor in the criminology department at Wright State University; he was an avid innovator and a person that, word for word, reflects the best of RED!’s mission when it expresses that we also profile innovators that help facilitate transformation in the lives of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals.

Doc was on the front line of working with incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals. He taught for many years in Dayton Correctional Institution (D.C.I.).  Doc recently - and ironically - was on the front line with his late friend, Dennis Bussell, whose memorial service he even officiated this summer, as beautifully recalled by Dennis’ widow Terah, in a lovely narrative she wrote about Doc’s passing last night.

Bless you, Terah.  Your words were the first written and published upon Doc’s passing, and he would not want it any other way.

Yes, Doc was an innovator. I had the great pleasure of watching his brilliant mind and speaking in action, especially in The Psychology of Incarceration (P.O.I.) course, which he taught with RED! columnist Khalil Osiris at Franklin Pre-Release Center in Columbus, Ohio. Doc was part of our teaching team.

We had one really profoud evening in April 2007 when Doc, Dennis, Khalil, Julie George, and four others presented to the P.O.I. class of 36 students at Franklin Pre-Release. It was a monumental evening of sharing, receiving, and being - being available to receive the wisdom and insight especially from Doc, who eloquently shared the reasons why he believed these incarcerated women were on the verge of new healthy lives and relationships, a new world outside of prison.

Doc had an instinctual, storytelling way of speaking, an aesthetic that was rooted deeply in Native American lore and healing. In fact, his words did heal. (I remember Doc telling my own students once about a man named Lonnie whom he mentored; he’d helped Lonny embrace his transformation. It was a special story, and I sensed that Doc’s words to Lonnie, over months, were full of healing.)

I’ll never forget Khalil saying to my students once, “Doc never once missed teaching a class session at Wright State - in all his many, many years of teaching at the univesity. He was the most dedicated teacher I ever met.”

Doc was an optimist. He and Khalil visited my Cincinnati Authors course in the summer of 2007 and articulated to a new generation of students how formerly incarcerated individuals are changing the world in a pro-active, positive, and untold way. Humble, as always, in their delivery, they recounted success stories, and I know my students were enlightened. My students talked to me for days afterward, reminding me that they’d never heard of such amazing life changes. 

I said, “That’s because Doc and Khalil live out the message they bring - they are about positive and permanent change, and they’ll believe, teach, and help bring it about until they die.”

Doc and Khalil, along with Tony Villa, Sr., wrote The Psychology of Incarceration book and curriculum. As a result, P.O.I. is now used in prisons, jails, educational institutions, and community programs as one of a cutting-edge approach to address transformation and recidivism. Doc also helped write publications for Hambleyeca House.

Arlene Mendenhall, of the Miami Valley Council for Native Americans, wrote Doc’s friends: “I am so sorry to pass along to you the information that our friend and Council member, Robin Herman, walked on at 9:45 p.m. last night. Thank you to all who have inquired about him and kept in touch. and to those who visited with him often during his last days. He was much loved and we will all miss him….”

It was, again, an immense pleasure to listen to Sister Helen Prejean share her insights into the ongoing moral dilemma of the death penalty. This is the second time in three years that I’ve sat transfixed by S. Helen’s tremendous knowledge of social justice issues and by her compassion.

Sister Helen’s visit to Cincinnati on Sept. 21 and 22 has been sponsored by Xavier University and its Peace and Justice Programs, Students for Life, and by Ohioans to Stop Executions (OTSE).  It was standing-room-only last night at the university’s Cintas Center conference room; approximately 300 visitors packed the room.

It’s also the second time in three years I thought to myself, when encountering a guest speaker, “I haven’t looked at my watch one time. This is an amazing presentation, a gift of a communicator.”  I teach communication studies - and literature and writing. I scrutinize speakers all the time. I really pay attention to good writing. Helen Prejean, a great writer, is also one of the wisest and most gifted speakers on any circuit. She opposes the death penalty. She cherishes life. She abhors a government’s decision to torture, and she talked Monday night about the death penalty as a kind of torture.  There is real compatibility.

S. Helen treated us to the discoveries and inner strength she grappled with while eventually ministering to death row inmate Patrick Sonnier, in Louisiana, in the 1980s. Sonnier was sentenced to die in 1978 for the Nov. 5, 1977 rape and murder of Loretta Bourque, 18-years old, and David LeBlanc,, 17.

Her charisma is not manufactured for effect. It is real. It’s not a grassroots-type “here-I-am-take-notice” charisma. It’s God-ordained, and you feel it the minute she walks into a room. She first and foremost loves to know who you, the visitor, are. She asks, “What are you doing?”

“I’m so glad to be here,” she told RED!’s web editor. S. Helen’s confidence is only rooted of God’s grace that she speaks about; it rises out of her love for Jesus and not, as Oswald Chambers speaks about, the “idea” of Jesus.  No, her commitment to Christ is deep-rooted, and the more so, the less preachy she comes off.  In fact, for all her activism and anti-death penalty discourse, she is never preachy. Her passion just “is”.  It simply “means”, and she’ll let you figure it out from there.

She also struggles: her upcoming new memoir, River of Fire, explores her spiritual journey, and the journey has never been a cakewalk.  I’ll write a bit more about Helen’s journey in a new blog, because RED! web editor, Christine Grote, is interviewing Sister this afternoon.  I’ll join them and learn more.

If you’ve never listened to Helen Prejean speak, here’s a clip.  If you’ve never read her writing, you are missing one of our most brilliant writers of memoir. Dead Man Walking is and deserves to be an American classic, a book that has surely influenced other great memoirists like Mary Karr and Tobias Wolff.  Because of its accessible depth and pacing alone, I’m sure these writers have paid attention to Dead Man Walking’s music: haunting, indelible, wrenching in a way you want the music of best prose.

Write, Sister. Squirrel away that time.

I’m waiting for the memoir, River of Fire. I will be first in line.