Much, if not all, of the graffiti world revolves around identity. In fact, graffiti artists spend their days perfecting, designing, and constructing innovative ways to display their graffiti name. In that spirit, the central point of these art pieces would be the name of each student. As names are given to identify, lay claim, or acknowledge the life of a person, we asked the students to do a search for the meaning behind their birth names. As we reviewed their findings, I asked them to consider the following definition of identity.

Identity – the condition of being oneself, and not another. The sense of self. The distinguishing character or personality of an individual. While the dictionary gave a vast array of definitions for identity, these were the ones I had asked the students to focus on for their projects.

I must note that as an alternative to the “identity piece,” I gave the students permission to create graffiti projects on whatever theme they wanted. Themes such as sports teams, music groups, car styles, or anything else. However, that permission came with a challenge. I challenged them to approach this project as if it were to be an inside peek into their souls. I asked them to think about ways they lament over being misunderstood, fighting to survive lives seemingly destined for chronic pain, and feeling helpless over systems that are oppressive. I challenged them to give themselves the permission to pause for a brief moment and use this project to explore timeless truths about their identity that would forever be part of their story at this place in their lives. To all of our surprise, they accepted my challenge and decided unanimously to make all of their projects reflections of their life story.

With all the excitement of learning graffiti, our projects started with a meaningful pause for life to be told. What follows is a poem by one of the students, who discovered that the meaning of her name translates to Song Poet. Here is her poem; look for more posts on this project as we continue.

Broken Love by Song Poet
I am a child of God.
I am the only child.
I am shy with a problem.
I am artistic and hard working.

I am a child of abandonment.
I am alone and scared.
I am loved by my godfather.
I am a child that had to grow up before my time.
I am scared what will happen to me.
I am the forgotten.
I am artistic and hard working.

I am the broken hearted.
I am the one running from the cops and jumping fences.
I am the one that was beaten.
I am the child that did witchcraft.
I am the child running from God.
I am the child that’s used.
I am the child that’s misunderstood.
I am the artistic.

I am on top of my life.
I am the child that has scars inside and out.
I am proud of my accomplishments.
I am the last one standing.
I am an artist and hard worker at heart.
I am me, for me, and no one else.
In pace requiescat. (Latin for Rest In Peace)
Nemo me impune lacessit. (Latin for Let him who would offend me beware)

Sam Trujillo
always feels pain
never turns down healing
sees life everywhere