Great review on Seinfeld at CitySquare!

Take a look here at the review by the Dallas Morning News on CitySquare's "A Night to Remember 2016" with Jerry Seinfeld. 

The big "fix"

The Battle: Questions

Tedious is the battle
For poor folks
Striving to live,
Not some ordinary,
Solitary, eeking
Existence; but
Really to live life
Even as preachers with
Suspect theology would
Suggest!

Can my children succeed?
Can my home be safe?
Can my diabetes be controlled?
Can my girl earn a fair wage?
Can my table be spread?
Can my old car start?
Can my boss be fair?
Can my son be promoted?
Can my momma be lifted?
Can my color be an asset?
Can my father know my love?
Can the cops love me?
Can my side of town be honored?
Can my clothes be pressed?
Can my offering be valued?
Can I find a quiet place?
Can I expect better?
Can I pray and see progress?
Can I find real hope?
Can someone see me for who I am, really?
Can I love my community?
Can I love my enemies?
Can my enemies learn enough to love me?
Can we all get along?
Can my soul be found?  Saved?
Can playgrounds be built? 
Can playgrounds be safe?
Can sidewalks be repaired?
Can homes be built? 
Can neighborhoods be made over?
Can re-investment come my way?
Can opportunity be multiplied?
Can REITs work where I live?
Can I relocate to a "high opportunity" community?
Can the national dream be realized?
Can I contribute to someone's life and well being?
Can I be truly needed?
Can a child look up to me?
Can I be worthy of respect?
Can crack houses disappear?
Can City Hall work at last?
Can I win
the Battle?

Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane

Thelonious Monk with John Coltrane / At Carnegie Hall

Reduced

two beggars

befriend me
for twenty
bucks apiece
every week.

telling stories
give cause
and rationale
for lies
that pay.

witness creativity,
both bring
me joy
and laughter,
friendship stuff.

one man
one woman
both smiling
love me,
use me.

others advise
stop funding
continued failure
for friends
I love.

how different
are "respectable"
friends who
do the
same things?

mercy, Lord
dear Lord
open me
to life,
their life.

Shining eyes

Films for February

Looking for quality films to take in during African American History Month? 

Check this source!

High Hopes

Bruce Springsteen's latest gets at much of what we witness, engage and struggle with on a daily basis.

This note came to me after our all-staff meeting on Tuesday.  Inside look into the world of CitySquare!

The TED Talk reminded me of a new program at the J. Erik Jonsson Central Library that launched in September with the help of two CitySquare AmeriCorps members.  The program is an effort to more proactively embrace the homeless neighbors who regularly visit the library, a constituency that has long been ignored, marginalized and dismissed by fellow patrons and library staff. In fact one homeless neighbor expressed that she has visited the library every day for the past 10 years and has never been addressed or approached by a staff member…until now.

To more effectively understand the needs of these neighbors, the library now hosts a regular “Coffee & Conversations” hour where homeless neighbors are directly engaged in conversation with each other and perhaps more notably, with library staff. For the first time in the library’s history, staff are learning the names, stories, needs, interests and dreams of folks they have discounted for years.

New programs are being implemented at the library that is driven and developed by the homeless for the homeless. The change is transformational and exciting and it would not be possible without the two AmeriCorps members.

If you ever visit the Central Library, you will see a Resource Center on the first floor staffed by two members. They are available daily to any neighbor in need of referral services – or even just to chat. The next Coffee & Conversations is this Thursday, December 5^th at 2 pm on the first floor. If you are available, I encourage you to stop by! In fact, one of the projects they are starting is a podcast with these neighbors to share their stories and there has already been a request to get an interview with you!

Here are the two members serving downtown, both are Food on the Move alum from last summer as well! (L: Antoinette Carey Spriggs; R: Dominique Edwards)

  

Had to share!

In service,

Jennifer A. Rajkumar

Director of AmeriCorps 

Seeing people. . .refusing to turn away

Diana Ross coming to CitySquare next Friday night, September 13!

We still have a few seats remaining!  

To buy your tickets click here.

In addition, you still have time to become an event sponsor by going here.

Eternal Lamp

The constant sun breaks through familiar shade trees,
My canopy bed of leaves, branches and damp heat
Cannot block the rising of this eternal lamp.

Once on the rise, the heat yields to nothing, to no one
In the task of warming the ground and radiating concrete,
My home in this unforgiving city.

My daily trek begins today, early before many rustle,
As always, somehow seeking food, water and a hassle-free day
Building against hunger, thirst and law enforcement.

The brilliant sun has not been informed of my
Criminal life and status in this city of great muchness,
Shining down on us all, even on me, one rejected.

Living in such blinding light, yet I remain unnoticed by most,
As if I am not here; But the salty sweat on my face
Reassures me that I am present indeed.

No matter how hot, this light, my friend,
The One with hot fierceness refusing not to
Turn its unfailing light on ME!

Faith at CitySquare

Song and faith just happens at CitySquare and in the CityWalk community!

 Come see us!

 

Fabulous Diana Ross Partners with CitySquare for 25th Anniversary Celebration!!!

How do you celebrate 25 years of fighting poverty in Dallas for an organization that assisted nearly 70,000 people last year? We have just the event! CitySquare's A Night To Remember featuring the legendary Diana Ross Help us prove there "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" in our efforts to fight poverty by clicking the buttons below for ticket and sponsorship information. All proceeds support the programs and services at CitySquare. With your help, we can feed the hungry, heal the sick, house the homeless, and renew hope in the heart of our city. To become a Sponsor click here! To purchase tickets click here!

Blessed by grandchildren!

Gracie sings!

Henry enjoys a fresh haircut (though his dad may be in a bit of trouble!).

What a blessing, and I have two other grandsons, Wyatt and Owen, who'll be featured in coming days!

Just humor me.

Little Hen

To a proud granddad, this is pure genius and delight!

 Henry loves to sing!

 I love to hear him.

 Enjoy!

Bottom Line Banner on Dallas Morning News front page yesterday!

CitySquare will host singing sensation, Diana Ross on Friday, September 13, 2013 as a part of our 25th Anniversary in working with neighbors to overcome poverty in the Metroplex.

 Mark you calendar today! 

  Sponsorship options are available!

Wild urban beauty!

Art and Community Design event!

DMA membership to be free!

Five good reasons to visit the soon-to-be-free Dallas Museum of Art

Michael Granberry / Reporter
November 28, 2012 | Permalink

Dallas Morning News--Arts GUIDE

For those who now have a license to visit the Dallas Museum of Art for free — well, at least you will when the “free” policy begins Jan. 21 — here’s a snapshot of what we recommend about the DMA, which will also free membership via its new Friends and Partners program:

1) Every Thursday from 5 to 9 p.m., you can take in the DMA’s “Thursday Night Live”program. Tomorrow night, you can listen listen to the Carolyn Lee Jones Sextet as part of the DMA’s Thursday night jazz series.

2) Through March 13, you can see the work of Glasgow-based artist Karla Black, who recently created two sculptures for the DMA, her first such project in the United States. As the DMA says in its own description, “Transforming light, fragile, often impermanent materials into powerful sculptures of commanding scale and presence, Black creates abstract works that resolutely eschew metaphor while simultaneously beckoning a complex series of associations.”

3) Texas art. The DMA offers Texas Artist Databases, a list of titles and dates for exhibitions presented by the DMA since 1909, and the Otis Dozier Sketchbooks, a digital collection that includes “nearly 1,500 sketches. When complete, it will make available over 6,200 images that comprise a complete representation of 130 sketchbooks by Texas regionalist artist Otis Dozier (1905-1987).”

4) The DMA’s current hot show, “Posters of Paris: Toulouse-Lautrec and His Contemporaries,”wraps up the day before free admission and free memberships begin. Even so, it’s a can’t-miss. Beginning with the early designs of “Jules Chéret – the ‘father of the poster’ — the exhibition explores the earliest days of the affiche artistique [artistic poster] and its flowering in Paris, first under Chéret in the 1870s and 1880s, and then with a new generation of artists including Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,Pierre Bonnard, and Edouard Vuillard, artists who brought the poster to new heights in the 1890s.” The DMA says the exhibition “examines the story of the French artistic poster in all its complexity.”

5) The DMA is a community resource, which is why director Maxwell Anderson’s push to go “free” is so brilliant, because it puts the museum within reach of the entire community. On a regular basis, it hosts Arts & Letters Live (which brings name authors to town), lectures, gallery talks, concerts, film, teen workshops and other family events. The DMA is home to 22,000 works of art, spanning 5,000 years, though not all are on view at any one time. Artists whose work is currently on view include Jackson Pollock and Claude Monet. Plus, the DMA is home to a highly acclaimed African art collection.