Below you can read Hannah Griffith's poem Stuck in the Split Space in her own hand from her journal. Click on any image to enlarge. A transcription of the poem follows the images.
A woman whose womb feels full of seeds, not eggs.
Why are you?
Half Mexican, half White
But look like a "What are you?"
Spanish on my tongue taster like the bitter
appropriation of my own culture.
Where are you?
From a place that connected fried hair
and pale skin to ascension.
Nevermind the wide nose and wider thighs.
Don't look if you can help it.
Too full, mija.
Too holed, child.
Not enough, woman.
My degrees fill me up and emanates shadows
over my tattoos and piercings.
My eyes glaze over at drug-fueled bar
Conversations Spiraling from something less
into nothingness.
What is this place?
A split space.
A misplaced face in a sea of people whom never quite deface,
but nonetheless lead to a feeling of displace-men(t).
A place where women rule and men roam.
I try to spool the thread, but end up
unraveling the miles of women who've
carved and shaped the passageways to
HERE.
What if Texas Teachers hadn't beaten
the Spanish off my grandmother's tongue?
What if my mather and aunties had
teachers who rubbed their swollen bellies
and healed their blackened bruises?
What if my eight schools hadn't eaten me
up and swallowed me whole - unknowingly
guarding me in their wombs against
resentful beatings from familiar fists?
What if my sister had a fighting chance
to relinquish the images in her heed,
instead of being thrown in this covid-
soaked rat race of life at 17?
What if the ghost whose haunted my
dad long before my 28 years- whose name I share and presence I felt
through his abandonment and evictions,
methamphetamized crazes and religious
contradictions- had been the catalyst
to teach resilient strength,
instead of a justified sinking?
As I explore the halls of New Legacy
and tether a piece of my heart to
this community, I Know any of us
could have walked here and been
entrusted and encased in this space; and
felt split-yet stretched,
morphed and reshaped.
Where love endlessly permeates through
ambiguous structures, and soft hands
offer the reform of mind.
A newly chosen-perhaps discarded,
but never frozen
consciousness defined.
The what-ifs can simply be myths
to hold onto;
but here are based transparently
upon two:
parent - child
teacher - student
admin- educator
Where the ifs turn into
hows and whens and whys
that shape the whos -
no matter the wheres.
We are here together.
Split.
Re-pieced.
Broken.
Re-paired.
U.S.
Storyteller
Hannah Griffith
Teacher
Hannah Griffith is from Orange County, the eldest of seven, and a first generation college graduate. She received her Bachelor's degree in Literature/Cultural Studies and a Masters degree in Education from UC San Diego. She currently teaches 8th grade English, Advisory and Broadcast Journalism. She is three years into her profession and continues to develop her craft everyday. Hannah loves guiding her students, exploring diverse works of literature and other artistic mediums, and fostering community and collaboration between her students and colleagues.