Frederick Hammersley Fund, for for the Arts New Mexico PBS Great Southwestern Arts & Education Endowment Fund, and the Nellita E. Walker Fund for KNME-TV at the Albuquerque Community Foundation New Mexico Arts, a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs and by the National Endowment for the Arts and Viewers Like You.

Exploring how the power of poetry can transcend time, Santa Fe’s sixth poet laureate Darryl Lorenzo Wellington confronts themes of racial and social injustice and reads his poem, “10PM, Stopped.

Frisked.” Blakk Sun turns struggle into verse reclaiming his voice through poetry rap and raw emotion.

"...welcome me with outreached arms like a present..." The “Assembly” transforms a historic building into a thriving hub where creatives and tech innovators connect and collaborate.

It's all ahead on Colores!

Speaking Truth >>Faith: So when you sit down to write, what do you start with Do you start with like an emotion, an idea?

What's the first thing that comes to your mind in your process?

>>Darryl: Both, Faith, >>Faith: Okay.

>>Darryl: but it has to be an idea, that also inspires an emotion, I have lots of ideas, but all of them have an emotional element, I mean an emotional element in the sense that I also want to present you with a feeling of, "what to do about this?"

or a feeling of, " why this is important?"

And so they're connected and I have inspirations that relate to various feelings about social justice issues, to even observations about sensation, the most tantalizing ideas are; you feel you have never read expressed before.

That's a very important lesson about creativity because so many people simply want to imitate things they have seen before.

You can begin like that, but the real excitement is; what is it in your experience, which is unique and which you have never quite seen or formed the way you would like to do it.

>>Faith: What do you express that you haven't seen before?

>>Darryl: I'm from The South originally and now I live in the Southwest.

and in both places I've written extensively about social and racial justice and comparing the similarities between the two that’s something I'd never seen before.

Just noticing what is very similar about arguments made by the huge black population in The South and discussions going on in Santa Fe and throughout New Mexico about Native and chicanX justice, and noticing the parallels between them.

“10PM, Stopped.

Frisked.” One man cries, I am, I am, in ecstasy and terror!

I am, as the Lord cried to Moses.

Three men dressed in camouflage, faces hardened, declined to listen ignoring a strangled plea descended from a timeless sensibility behind compassionate justice and ritual prophecy.

A nearby parking meter winks, cast an arbitrary light on an asphalt street corner Witnesses, nothing.

Glitters after dark.

Stands like a watchtower going senile totteringly decadent on duty to collect, poised to pinch, the nickels and dimes, the irrevocable fines, the regular tariffs, the evidence requisite, blind to other charges of citizenship.

>>Faith: Can you walk me through your poem, “10PM, Stopped.

Frisked."

What does it mean to you?

>>Darryl: Well, it is about a man being arrested, or I should say a person being arrested.

And one thing that interests me about that poem is that, he it doesn't quite say, other than that it’s 10:00PM, and someone is being stopped, and frisked, where this is happening, or when this is happening.

And so that really means it could be happening in 1930, 2024, or 3000, God forbid.

And it doesn't specifically give the motivation but that's so that the reader can parallels between how this might happen, have happened then, and how it may happen now.

It doesn't give a place or doesn’t name the person's race, and I'm from The South where obviously you associate this with happening to black people and now I live in New Mexico where you may associate it with happening to someone who's an immigrant who's being falsely detained.

That's what that poem means to me.

>>Faith: And especially during these times -- >>Darryl: Especially during these times!

Which I wrote that poem quite a bit before the present, shall we say, change in circumstances.

>>Darryl: And yet, because of those circumstances, the poem takes on an entirely new significance.

>>Faith: Yeah.

>>Darryl: Isn't that wonderful?

Not complimenting myself, but the art of poetry.

That's what it can do.

>>Faith: Speaking of your poem, that parking meter really feels like -- almost like an -- a character in your poem.

Can you talk to me about what that image represents?

I was really curious about that part.

>>Darryl: That's interesting!

What does that image represent?

I'm glad that it feels like a character in a poem.

One thing that a parking meter represents is time, you know, time watching us and time -- either changing or perhaps the idea that time has not changed I mean, that's what a parking meter is supposed do it’s supposed to measure time and it does, but what if the situation, despite of this measurement, it just seems to repeat rather than progress?

Perhaps that's what that image represents -- and also it’s an emblem of the state.

You know, that's who you're paying when you park -- I have no particular problem with paying for parking, by the [Both Laugh] but it's also an image that represents the state and it's power -- the power of the state to control time.

>>Faith: What's the meaning behind last line of the poem?

>>Darryl: Yes.

“Blind to other charges of citizenship."

Well, I think it's self-explanatory the presence of the state has not changed significantly.

The injustice of the situation, that's what it means to me, but I very much dislike giving my own poems specific meanings I'd rather the reader infer that for themselves.

That's the part of what makes literature, at its best, immortal.

It's capacity for the reader to infer meaning for themselves and that, my friends, is also the part that the state and various bureaucratic power’s most fear.

>>Faith: Yeah, thinking for ourselves.

>>Darryl: Right, exactly!

[Both laugh ] >>Faith: And at the heart of all your work, what is the deeper reason you write?

What keeps you coming back to the page?

>>Darryl: Racial or social justice is important to me, but yet, no one issue is really the reason why I write.

As I often tell students, the origin of the word poetry is a Greek word, "Poiesis," which simply means to make, or to create.

Poetry to me is simply tied to the human imagination itself.

That's why, at least in my case, I try to express myself in different mediums, but that's not important.

What is important is this idea of perfection, is this idea of beauty, which you will never reach nor you should but to have it as an ideal, that's what's important, and that, just the pleasure of making something, that's why I, and I actually think, most people, do it.

[ Singing ] Every time that you called.

[Music] >>Michael: My name is Michael.

People call me Blakk Sun.

I'm a spoken word artist, rapper, actor, improvizationalist, your friendly neighborhood black man.

[Laughs] I started with rap, you know, Kriss Kross when I was little, wear my clothes backwards, record my little brother on a Barbie tape recorder.

You know what I'm saying?

That’s, like Max Han instrumental So, that's where it started at.

But the poetry came in, from a friend of mine, actually I wasn't able to c reate with music at the time And he was like, "well, why don't you try poetry?

"You got a lot to say.

Why don’t you try it that way?"

[Contunied Interview] And I'm glad I did.

I'm glad I listened to him, because at first I didn't want to but it helped me expand my writing capacity.

[Reciting Poem] I figured I compensate by doing what other people did.

You know, following the lead.

Whatever conflicting deeds.

I just did the things I seen, hoping someone would feel my presence and welcome me with arms outreached like a present and a smile that said, "welcome" even if just for a second, but it never came.

[ Continued Interview ] With poetry I could slow down I could speed up, I could go in depth, and you know -- it helped me to enhance my creativity of how I want to capture what I'm tryin to say.

I'm not a man of many words, per se, and if I was my words probably wouldn't be in depth about me.

So, with my music, I'm able to create a mood with it.

So, this song is a song that I wrote, the song I was telling you about why I wrote, It’s mad dark, but it’s -- just a question.

It's not like -- I'm actually trying to do it or thinking about it, it's just a question, and the reasons why.

[MUSIC ] Maybe I'll never know what the meaning of life is.

I asked for signs, they never show.

I ask to be cultivated, but purpose in me doesn't grow.

And if I don't have it than is life worth living?

I don't know.

So, I flirt with thoughts of ending it, I don't think it matters much.

I ain't had too many things invested.

My bank account, the time spent was reckless.

I ain't really love enough.

Memories of me must feel like burdens so, if I checked out, they probably wouldn't notice or be happy that I'm gone.

Sweat off of they brow maybe ending it my own way would be the thing to make them proud like I was a man again.

Still not a father, owning up to my responsibilities I didn't bother, I made too many mistakes.

No give, I just take.

Place on others, all my weight.

Banking on they backs to break.

[Continued Interview] People receive stories different ways.

So, that's why I do so many different things.

I act to play a character because people identify with characters.

If you wanted to identify with me you would listen to my poetry and you would get a chance to hear my emotions, lay it out in front you, but it's all about connectivity, and those are the ways that I use for me to seem human to everybody else.

If I'm talking about me, that's when I do the riffing thing Like, you know, I just play with sounds, the way my voice sounds, how I'm feeling at that time.

And, it would probably start with just a few little words.

And, you know, I might say something that I like.

I'm like, “okay, that's the topic."

Or if I'm writing about -- sometimes I'm asked to write poetry or something about stuff, and I wouldn't want to mislead the people through the message.

So, I fact check, I do research, my Google hand is crazy.

I gather as much as I can and then write about it, and I don't really like to revise a lot.

So, I want to make sure that I get it right pretty much the first time.

[ Freestyling ] Struggling to find my path to show me some things that I wanted But when life started getting bad, you aint’ want to help me confront it, And in the back of my mind, I knew you were always going to leave me, because everything is temporary.

And that's why I every time that you called, every time that you called, every time that you called, I always came running.

There was no discussions.

[Continued Interview] I got speakers in my car, [Laughs] and in the basement, It hits you harder, it'll make you feel different.

[Laughs] And nobody else can hear me.

Sometimes I'm a little shy with my voice.

Especially when I don't know what I'm doing with it.

So, I'm just, you know, I'm in the car I got a couple of things playing -- I might be in my head about something and I just start making noises and whatever comes out, comes out, that's how, I try not to reject anything because, I mean, obviously, I was feeling it, and I try to, bring whatever is sticking the most to the forefront.

I started doing poetry while I was in prison.

That's why I couldn't do music.

Before that, when I was a teenager, I got locked up when I was 18.

So when I was a teenager, I didn't do poetry at all because I was only doing music as a way for me to continue to create.

I was challenged with the poetry thing.

It turned into something that was really good for me.

And when I got out here, I really was doing more poetry than anything.

That was great for me because that's my therapy.

So, you know, I did that.

I did the music and I'm like, all right, now, let's dabble in the beats, let's make some beats, try to, just try to enhance everything that I can while I'm doing it.

And it's a process.

But yeah, I started while I was in prison and I was there for a long time.

The song that I'm creating a beat for right now is a song that I wrote in prison.

I did something to get here, and you have to pay the consequences for that, but knowing that I'm done with the life that I was living in and I still can't leave and I have to wait.

So it's a waiting game.

And the song, it's really about like, I don't want to wait anymore.

People tell me all the time, like, "You're a leader!"

Back then, I was not though, I was a very good follower and I was following the wrong things.

I'm still figuring me out.

I know I'm a good writer.

I know I can write about a lot of things I don't necessarily know if I’ve found my sound yet.

We all got influences, and I can still hear my influences You might not be able to, but I know where they're coming from So, my sound, which is a challenge, I feel for every artist, but that's where I'm at with it now.

And, you know, other than that, I still be, I'm still out here, like, not in the streets.

I'm out here in the capacity of -- actually, I take it back.

I am still in the streets because I was just at Barnett Library yesterday mentoring some young people.

So I am still in the streets.

But in a much, much better way now And I'm happy with it.

[ Reciting Poetry ] I'm on to you Honest Abe.

We’re detrimental to your reign more than a paragraph or page, and when people read those chapters they’ll see that your claim to fame was just a new way to oppress us by changing the rules to your own game.

And the shrills and shrieks of people just like me keep my dreams haunted.

And thinking about tackling this battle justly can be daunting, but if you gave us freedom just exercise your power, trying to flaunt it, then thanks, but no thanks, Mr. Lincoln I don't want it.

[ Crowd applause ] Building Connections.

[ Music ] >>Drew: This place is a canvas this place is an opportunity for creatives just like us to make a mark.

You can do things here that you can't do in other places, that's pretty compelling.

[ Music ] The Assembly was all about, " So let's make a mark to show everyone this is here, it's happening in a really big way."

[ Music ] We made Assembly to be sort of the center of gravity for the creative and technology industries here in Hampton Roads to bring amazing creative and technology companies together, have them share sort of a space under one roof, do all the amazing work that their doing for brands around the world, products and services, and see what happened when those people all got together.

It's an arresting space, when you walk in, these sort of towering ceilings, natural light everywhere, the historic character of the building, the terrazzo floors, the exposed ceilings, I mean, it's a stunning space on it's own.

When you think about it through the lens of what it's made to do is where, I think, where it gets really exciting.

We've built this huge common area through the middle, We've cut this atrium through the center of the building, and that's all about, not just creating a travel corridor through the building, but creating those connections between people.

As you walk through this first phase this first building, you're seeing all these amazing companies, all the people in this work, literately building world-class products and services Just to take that in, it's not just the character of the building, but the character of what's happening here, is probably where it gets exciting on another level.

[ Music ] >>Mel: When we opened WPA, we immediately kind of followed Drew to the core of Downtown as did many of our other friends who started companies.

It was writers, architects, artists working together to attract and retain talent in Norfolk All of us had been grappling with the idea of -- in order to accelerate our own companies, we needed to have all of these spaces and tools at our disposal.

We needed large meeting spaces.

We needed casual meeting spaces.

We needed podcast rooms.

None of our companies could afford any of those things on our own.

And thinking about this in terms of pooled or shared resources, could we do this in such a way that we could outfit a building with 15,000 square feet of shared amenities and, not only save on resources doing that, but actually have these spontaneous collisions where we're running into other people who can help push us and our ideas and our companies forward.

So, that's really the genesis of the idea.

And then that took a very physical form, in the design of the building.

How do you design a building so that it welcomes people in?

It draws them through central spaces where peo ple are almost forced to run into each other And that's the stair that spans from the lobby up to the fifth floor of the new penthouse.

And that's how we run into each every day.

>>Hunter: We were the first tenant to move into Assembly.

We are the front door to the entrepreneurial and start ecosystem here in Hampton Roads and the 757.

We’re so privileged to have Studios which is a one of a kind model, be housed and an office campus as unique as Assembly, where we're surrounded with innovators and creatives and people that are challenging the status quo in whatever their respective industry is.

Being able to come together to share ideas, to be able to network, to be able to connect.

The magic comes together all of the time, connecting investors, mentors, people that are running successful start-up's, everything in the middle, that all come together under one roof, is just absolutely invaluable My grandfather was an architect and he said that, "Anybody can design a building, but what separates the good from the great is all in the details."

And there has not been a detail that has not been carefully thought of throughout this entire project.

It's hard to believe that it's a 102-year-old building that we're standing in ‘cause it certainly doesn't look like that.

>>Mel: The building was originally designed as an exhibition hall, so think World’s Fairs.

It was a showplace for anything that they wanted to house and showcase in the region.

After that, it became the Ames and Brownley Department store.

I know my grandmother remembers that and she would come downtown to go shopping and to have lunch with my grandfather who was down at the Roister building Over time, it changed to Rice’s Department store and if you walk around downtown now that's the department store that everyone remembers.

>> Robert: The building itself has about 10,000 square feet per floor.

We've added some mezzanine space between the first and second floor And then we've also been able to add some rooftop space, so that there's additional function up there.

You walk in and you feel the presence of a sort of boutique hotel where you can just land and start working We tend to lean into the idea of co-working space, but this is kind of taking it to a next level I went into it with a healthy understanding of what we would find and it taught me that I didn't -- didn't know quite as much as I expected to about the building I knew enough about the construction of the time from past projects, also learned quite a bit about the historic approach to buildings like this, not as a preservation project, but just as honoring the building at that moment in time.

>>Drew: There was certainly a lot of dreaming and a lot of pinning and sketching and all of that for years, probably the better part of a year before we actually sat down and started doing this.

>>Mel: Drew is the type of client that wants to see almost every possible iteration.

So, in every programmatic piece of every room in here, we kind of tessellated in every different direction so he could see what it looked like or felt like to have the sunlight come through with the shared meeting room here and the coffee shop here, versus this other location.

So , we probably have 50 different floor plans for this building.

It took some time.

>> Drew: Goal number one is bring out the character of the space.

I mean, the character of the space by itself is remarkable.

If we can just bring that out, we get a magnificent building.

And then our challenge was, how do we add to that; a modern character that respects the history and feels appropriate for the space but brings it to life as this modern business hub?

>>Mel: It's the difference in how someone answers the question; why should I go back to the office?

We've all been very comfortable working from home.

We could dress comfortably.

We're close to the fridge.

We could take walks.

Why in the heck would anyone want to come back to the office?

And I think the answer is; a real designed space that allows you to collaborate and to work together efficiently and have spaces that feel like home >> Drew: It made no sense, financally.

It was a stretch to say the least.

To, you know, put really everything on the line for this project.

It was about the vision.

And, I think we’ve realized a part of that, but there's a huge piece of this vision that has yet to come, so that's what's keeping me going.

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Funding for COLORES was provided in part by: Frederick Hammersley Fund, New Mexico PBS Great Southwestern Arts & Education Endowment Fund, and the Nellita E. Walker Fund for KNME-TV at the Albuquerque Community Foundation New Mexico Arts, a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs and by the National Endowment for the Arts and Viewers Like You.