I don’t live in the safest part of town.
my neighborhood is one of those zip codes that lead the city in serious crimes. people here often feel hemmed in by violence, always scanning for a way out. and I get it.
just yesterday, in the shadow of the elevated train tracks, I saw a little kid lift his small fingers into the shape of two tiny pistols and fire off imaginary shots — pop pop — like he’d already seen too much.
but I don’t feel the same urgency to escape. this place holds me. it shapes me. just as I try to make sense of it in the songs I write.
there are small storefronts with dusty windows, corner bodegas where the air smells like fried plantains and cheap incense, and a church not far from me where, in the evenings, you can hear Ave Maria carried across the blocks like a prayer wrapped in static.
some streets are poorly lit. vacant lots sit forgotten, overgrown with silence and stories no one quite wants to tell.
Atlantic Avenue is its own kind of chaos — a street some folks avoid once the sun starts to slip. “don’t let the night catch you out there,” my abuela always warns. but I haven’t always listened.
still — I don’t dream of living anywhere else.
sometimes I need a break from it, though. I’ll get on my bike or skateboard and head out to other parts of Brooklyn, or across the city. it helps — just moving, seeing different blocks, letting things settle a bit.
I like the way the Verrazzano Bridge reveals itself when I ride down 5th Avenue. it’s not near where I live, but when I end up there, it always stops me for a second. the way it shows up feels like something patiently waiting, or just quietly watching.
but no matter how far I go, I always find my way back. this neighborhood raised me, and it keeps teaching me — how to listen, how to notice, and how to feel. it’s in the chords I reach for, and in the pauses between the words.
whether you’re a poet, a dancer, a painter, or a songwriter — the streets shape your rhythm, your palette, the silence between the lines.
but the feeling underneath it all — the ache, the beauty, the way love lingers in places, how some seasons won’t quite let go — that belongs to everyone, no matter where they’re from.
P.S. real-feel temp in Brooklyn today is 100 degrees. it’s summer. this is nABe —
I dream you here
we’re in Crown Heights
it’s so un-winter
you are the swings
in Arthur Somers Park
& I am all over you
& all day the
summer sky holds back
what it wants most to say
the same way
I keep words
beneath my clothes
I will try someday
to put winter away
cookie nieves 
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