INHUMANE, CRUEL, UNACCEPTABLE

State inspectors reviewed seven immigration detention facilities across California, including the recently opened California City detention facility in Kern County. Attorney General Rob Bonta said overcrowding and staffing shortages are creating dangerous conditions. “They are running these facilities with inhumane, cruel, and unacceptable conditions,” Bonta said.

The report documents allegations at several facilities, including delayed medical care, overcrowding, unsanitary living conditions, lack of clean drinking water and excessive use of force.

Investigators also reported six detainee deaths between September 2025 and March 2026, the highest number since California began conducting inspections in 2017.

At the California City facility, detainees described extremely cold conditions, leaking cells during rainstorms, and inadequate clothing. In April, Giovanni Gomez, a friend of a detainee held at the California City detention center, described what he said his friend experienced during transport to the facility. “She said that when she got captured, and they moved her from Bakersfield to the facility, they just put some chains in her feet, and then in her hands, and they put them in the cold room,” Gomez said.

State officials also said that, despite claims the crackdown targets violent criminals, many detainees reviewed during inspections had little or no criminal history.

—BakersfieldNow (KBAK), May 15, 2026

Joanne Kennedy Frazer is a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations. Since writing her first poem at age 73, she has been published well over 100 times. Having now achieved 84 years on this planet, she appreciates leisure to delight in its gifts, as well as time to grieve its desecration. Her second chapbook, Seasonings (Kelsay Books), was nominated for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. Her third book, Well Seasoned (The Poetry Box) has recently been published.  She lives in Raleigh, NC

Ralph La Rosa has published prose on major American writers, including Emerson and Thoreau, and has placed short fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and film scripts. These days, he mostly writes poetry, appearing on the Internet, in print journals and anthologies. His books include the chapbook Sonnet Stanzas and full-length Ghost Trees and My Miscellaneous Muse. And he loves The New Verse News!

THE WORLD ACCORDING TO ANDREW CARLOS

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

Cartoon by Nick Anderson

I am American

adopted 24 years ago

from Peten.

 

I am Guatemalan 

proud of my 

Mayan heritage.

 

I am American 

in a large family that I love 

(mom, dad, sisters, aunts, 

uncles, cousins, grandparents).

 

I am Guatemalan 

Some Americans are angry

that I am here 

in their country. 

 

I am American

work fulltime, 

attend university,

pay taxes, vote.

 

I am Guatemalan  

many who look like me

are torn from their

American lives

sent to detention centers

no due process. 

.

I am an American 

whose family 

is gravely concerned

for my welfare 

in these times.

 

I am a Guatemalan-American citizen.

Author's note: This is my grandson's life right now...I feel it needs to be shared.  

Joanne Kennedy Frazer, a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations, began writing poetry in her third stage of life, and has now been published more than 80 times in a variety of literary venues. Five poems were turned into a song cycle, Resistance, by composer Steven Luksan, and performed in Seattle and Durham. Her last chapbook, Seasonings (Kelsay Books), was nominated for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. She lives in Raleigh, NC.

DECEMBER 2024

a Golden Shovel poem based on a line from Wendell Berry’s “Sabbaths 2005 I”

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

distressed     appalled     by all    this

     i set alight    the Christmas Candle

       illumine my soul    against

darkness of hatred    of evil      that the

          culture      carries in the wind

Joanne Kennedy Frazer is a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations. She began writing in her early 70s, and has now been published more than 80 times in anthologies, on-line zines, and magazines. Five poems have been turned into a song cycle titled Resistance by composer Steven Luksan and performed in Seattle and Durham. Her latest chapbook Seasonings (Kelsay Books) was nominated for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. She lives in Raleigh, NC.

WAY OF LIFE FOR THREE YOUNG WOMEN

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer 

in observance of International Women’s Day

Elizabeth 

20 years old,

junior at an elite US university,

majors in physics.

Awarded a summer internship,

she will fly to Asia,

live at a Japanese university

while conducting research.

 

 

Gabriella

tiene 20 años,

completed high school, 

college beyond reach,

worked menial village jobs

until employment options dried up.

She will travel a perilous journey 

to the US in search of new opportunities. 

 

 

Bahija

تبلغ من العمر 20 عاما

student at college

on a campus now rubble, 

her family is no more, all slaughtered.

Hunger, destruction, death are her relatives.

When bombings start she runs to unsafe shelters

pleading with the world, why are you not helping us?

Author’s Note: UN International Women's Day, March 8, occurs during Women's History Month.  The UN resolution declares "full enjoyment of human rights...(requires women's) active participation, equality and development..." To honor its intention, I imagine and enter into the stories of three women "internationally" to illustrate vast differences in their lived experiences. While there has been modest advancement in some parts of the world, we have a long way to go globally in realizing the UN resolution.

 

Joanne Kennedy Frazer, a former justice and peace educator/director for faith based entities, enjoys spending her silvering years writing poetry and publishing in numerous anthologies, journals, and ezines. Her work is informed by social justice concerns and beauty of the natural world. She has written two chapbooks. Most recently, Seasonings (Kelsay Press) has been nominated for the Eric Hoffer Book Award.  She lives in Durham, NC.

MEDITERRANEAN CORRIDOR

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

From January 2023 to August 2023, inclusive, the UNHCR records that 2,314 people have died or been declared missing at sea on Mediterranean migration routes; the IOM similarly recorded 2,324 deaths or disappearances over the same time. —Wikipedia

For these burials     at sea

   the dead      are not sewn into sail cloth

 

No ceremony     no one prays over them

 

Their boat      converts to casket

      submerges     to a mass grave

                their last refuge

Joanne Kennedy Frazer (Durham, NC) enjoys spending her silvering years writing poetry and publishing in numerous anthologies, journals, and ezines. She has written two chapbooks. Most recently, Seasonings (Kelsay Press).

EXILE

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

Tapachula, Mexico, Mar 21 (EFE).- Thousands of migrants showed up here Tuesday at the offices of Mexico’s National Institute of Migration (INM) to apply for permits to travel by air to cities near the border with the United States. The travelers are using CBP One, a mobile app created by US Customs and Border Protection, to apply for asylum in the United States. CBP launched the app after Washington announced that it was ready to accept 30,000 migrants a month from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Cuba. —La Prensa Latina, March 21, 2023

we do it to survive

leave all we have known

a ripple in the river of humanity

 

we walk away from dried water  

carry music       stories of the ancients

that tell us who we are

 

we carry our beloved

bewildered children

on our backs      in our arms

 

we trek through jungles

cross over mountains

find         climb over bodies

 

we land in holding pens

of unknown places          disconnected

as the world runs in all directions

 

we ache for a welcome where one day

we will attain dignity        serenity

drink from renewed wells

 

Joanne Kennedy Frazer, a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations, is a third-act-of-life poet. She enjoys writing on issues of justice, the natural world and spirituality. Her work has appeared in numerous anthologies, journals and e-zines. Her second chapbook Seasonings (Kelsay Press) will be published in early 2023. She lives in Durham, NC.

REDEEM THE SOUL OF OUR NATION

an erasure/found poem

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

from John Lewis’s essay published in The New York Times on the day of his funeral 

Motivated by human compassion,
set aside race, class, age, 
language and nationality
to demand respect for human dignity.
 
Democracy is not a state.
It is an act.
 
Build the Beloved Community,
a nation and world society 
at peace with itself.
 
The vote is the most powerful 
nonviolent change agent 
in a democratic society.
 
We are all complicit 
when we tolerate injustice.
 
Each of us has a moral obligation
to stand up, speak up 
and speak out.
 
Redeem the soul of America 
by getting in good trouble, 
necessary trouble
 
Let freedom ring.
 
Walk with the wind,
brothers and sisters
 
Let the spirit of peace
and the power of everlasting love
be your guide.

Joanne Kennedy Frazer, a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations, is a third-act-of-life poet. She enjoys writing on issues of justice, the natural world and spirituality. Her work has appeared in numerous anthologies, journals and e-zines. Her second chapbook Seasonings (Kelsay Press), will be published in early 2023. She lives in Durham, NC.

WILLOW WEEP FOR ME

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

Caribou calves in the Utukok uplands in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska. Photo Credit: Patrick Endres/ Design Pics Inc., via Alamy and The New York Times.

The Biden administration defended in federal court the Willow project, a huge oil drilling operation proposed on Alaska’s North Slope that was approved by the Trump administration and is being fought by environmentalists… The multibillion-dollar plan from ConocoPhillips to drill in part of the National Petroleum Reserve would produce more than 100,000 barrels of oil a day until 2050. It is being challenged by environmental groups who said the Trump administration failed to consider the impact that drilling would have on fragile wildlife and that burning the oil would have on global warming… In a paradox worthy of Kafka, ConocoPhillips plans to install ‘chillers’ into the permafrost—which is thawing fast because of climate change—to keep it solid enough to drill for oil, the burning of which will continue to worsen ice melt. —The New York Times, May 28, 2021

on the other hand... 

The Biden administration on Tuesday suspended oil drilling leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge… The decision sets up a process that could halt drilling in one of the largest tracts of untouched wilderness in the United States, home to migrating waterfowl, caribou and polar bears. —The New York Times, June 1, 2021

Mother Nature’s

non-human earthlings

 

cultivate in the hearts    

of those

     who pay attention    

 

this wisdom:   

as we have co-evolved    

with human dwellers

they have relied   

on our nurturance

and guidance.

Earth now demands    

reciprocation. 

Joanne Kennedy Frazer is a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations at state, diocesan and national levels. Penning her life’s passions into poetry has become the delight and vocation of her silvering years. Her work has appeared in several Old Mountain Press anthologies, Poetic Portions 2015 anthology, Soul-lit Journal of Spiritual Poetry, Postcard Poems and Prose Magazine, Panoply Literary Zine, Snapdragon Journal, Whirlwind Magazine, Kakalak, Red Clay Review and The New Verse News. Five of her poems have been turned into a song cycle entitled Resistance by composer Steven Luksan, and performed in Seattle and Durham. Her chapbook Being Kin was published in 2019.  She lives in Durham, NC.

IT’S THE AMERICAN WAY

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

“Shootings never stopped during the pandemic: 2020 was the deadliest gun violence year in decades.” —Washington Post, March 24, 2021

 

consumed     with disgust,

          anger       at the other tribe?

 

have you given any thought     

      to addressing       your differences

     

    with, say,   

  the Ruger AR-556 assault weapon?    

 

you can buy one       on the world wide web

      right now       today      

 

Joanne Kennedy Frazer is a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations.  Her poetry has appeared in several anthologies, journals, ezines and magazines. Her chapbook Being Kin was published in 2019. Home is Durham, NC.

WEAVING JUSTICE

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

Bad Dog Metalworks

the great unraveling      has begun

frayed threads    of society’s      hidden
     fabric     are being pulled          violently

a crude quilt     erratically stitched     connects pieces      
     appliques      depict justice  
             point the oblivious     to cloaked truths


Joanne Kennedy Frazer is a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations at state, diocesan and national levels. Her work has appeared in several Old Mountain Press anthologies, Poetic Portions anthology, Soul-lit Spiritual Poetry, Postcard Poems and Prose Magazine, Panoply Literary Zine, Snapdragon Journal, Whirlwind Magazine, Kakalak, Red Clay Review and Gyroscope Review. Five poems were turned into a song cycle, Resistance, by composer Steven Luksan, and performed in Seattle and Durham.  Her chapbook Being Kin (CreationRising Press) was published in 2019.  She lives in Durham, NC.

MOURNING IN AMERICA

by Joanne Kennedy Frazer

I.
no vaccine for this condition

ever present     sucks out life
      soul      erases biographies

one knee
8 minutes, 46 seconds
   Momma, I love you

II.
lifeless daughters, sons of God

our grief       anger
   guilt       emptiness

ache    
to resurrect
     to re-breathe you

Joanne Kennedy Frazer is a retired peace and justice director and educator for faith-based organizations at state, diocesan and national levels. Her work has appeared in several Old Mountain Press anthologies, Poetic Portions anthology, Soul-lit Spiritual Poetry, Postcard Poems and Prose Magazine, Panoply Literary Zine, Snapdragon Journal, Whirlwind Magazine, Kakalak, Red Clay Review and Gyroscope Review. Five poems were turned into a song cycle, Resistance, by composer Steven Luksan, and performed in Seattle and Durham.  Her chapbook Being Kin (CreationRising Press) was published in 2019.  She lives in Durham, NC.