Running, free,
I remember,
the recess yard at Eden Gardens.
Walking, calm,
to the bus-stop,
past the junkyard and the field with the legendary two-headed snake.
Or under
the overpass
of the San Mateo Bridge, covered with graffiti.
Our backyard,
I remember,
looked out over Industrial Boulevard at the Shasta Soda Company, and I think the Kodak
factory, both of which I could see from the top of the swing set that Dad and Grandpa built
from scratch, and filled around with tan bark, I remember, dumped from a truck backed up
to our fence on that very busy, very Industrial Boulevard, and it had that slide that Dad adjusted
so it would be less scary for me, and my older brothers not-so-silently hated me for it, for making
Dad make the slide less fun for them.
Not perfect.
Never said so.
But I did really like growing up in Hayward.
Since turning to writing as a career, Matthew Cannelora has twice participated in Eastern Washington University's outreach program Writers in the Community, and participated in PEN America's Prison Writing Mentorship program. In 2018, he helped start "Ink from Within", a workshop dedicated to inmates pursuing publication.