Yahn Daht Cahm

The Simplest Tragedy

2026-04-12T00:01:17Z

The hand reaches

out into sunlight

is burnt by the food

and retreats

Confused it asks

for a rock to throw

through beams

and into shadow

it shatters something

made of glass

the sound of beauty

wasting

The Trauma Cycle: Homelessness and Stigma

2026-04-12T00:54:57Z

Just before midnight, in Austin, Texas, a man cried into a camera as he faced his first night on the streets.

Mike Black, a millionaire just 24 hours prior, had relinquished his luxury apartment and all monetary assets to attempt to earn a million dollars in a year, starting from nothing. Implementing his personal growth mindset, Black endeavored to overcome homelessness and poverty with business savvy and optimism. Although Black chose homelessness, his peers on the streets did not share the same freedom.

Homelessness is a complex phenomenon that is both caused by trauma, mental illness, substance use, systemic racism, and poverty, while also precipitating these issues (Padgett et al., 2020). Material causes for homelessness such as low working class income, high rental rates, low housing availability, and historical gentrification of inner-city slums are direct and visible causes of homelessness (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2018; Jones, 2015). However, the indirect and invisible causes for initial and continued homelessness are equally as powerful: stigma and trauma work silently to alienate vulnerable people from crucial resources and community. Stigma revives childhood trauma and creates tangible barriers to health, housing, and employment for people experiencing homelessness (PEH). Trauma and stigma cascade into one another, fueled by a dispositional view of people, a minimalist understanding of freedom and a refusal to acknowledge the material, social, and psychological prerequisites for membership in our society.

The ideological function of Negative Freedom creates a dispositional view of PEH so that they are viewed as responsible for their own subjugated position in society (Phelan et al., 1997; Johnstone et al., 2015). Believing in Negative Freedom means believing that everyone has the same shot at material success because freedom is based on the absence of external barriers. In other words: we are independent beings free to self-determine our position in society based on our innate work ethic, intelligence, and talent (Berlin, 1969; Carter, 2021). Positive Freedom conversely holds that situational factors allow or disallow access to success. This means we are interdependent beings requiring certain environmental nutrients to express our work ethic, intelligence, and talent; these environmental nutrients can be understood as Asset Citizenship.

To experience Asset Citizenship in our society, you need money, networks, and knowledge: money is capacity for change; networks are access points to resources; and knowledge is the ability to manage social and monetary assets. Mike Black, for example, had significantly more asset citizenship than other PEH as evidenced by his ability to quickly obtain shelter, feed himself, forge new relationships, and start a business. Without access to his fortune, Black used his manner of speaking, bachelor’s degree, pre-planned survival strategies, and emotional support from family and friends to maintain himself. Asset Citizenship therefore requires not just monetary, but social and epistemological resources. Because of this belief in Negative Freedom, though, Black omits his privileges from his explanation of success.

Stigma leaps from the gulf between optimism and reality. We can hear it hidden within Black’s logic at the end of his 19th installment in the series, shortly before he went home to live with his parents. He said:

“Set up the life that you want. Then it's a matter of how bad you want it.
Are you willing to put in the work? Most people aren’t.” (Black, 2020)

Unhoused people are consistently measured against this individualistic view of life, that associates a person's success or challenges with personal attributes—often work ethic. This view is called dispositionalism and it is not a universal human truth but rather a culture-specific tendency to draw causal lines to a person's character rather than their context (Lee et al., 1996). The view of Negative Freedom creates logical conditions for a dispositional mindset to arise. The thinking goes: if you are homeless, then it's probably your fault. For Black, PEH are tacitly the lazy, unmotivated foil for his material success. They are condemned as people not willing to put in the work (Phelan et al., 1997; Johnstone et al., 2015).

Research shows that stigma is a strong force for continued homelessness as it prevents the people experiencing it from seeking care from institutional sources, while reducing the quality of care provided (Reilly et al., 2022). Interpersonal stigma in the health care system emerges as discriminatory action by health care providers such as rushed discharge, mistrust of PEH, segregated appointment schedules and waiting rooms, and outright denial of care (Canham et al., 2024). Discrimination against PEH results in experiences of dehumanisation and power differentials. Unhoused patients report being treated as “subhuman” or “trash”, while anxiety about stigma leads to concealment of pregnancy, substance use, and other conditions from providers (Canham et al., 2024).

Outright denial of treatment and early discharge by health professionals harms PEH in the short term and long term. Abuse from health care professionals alienates PEH and results in substandard or nonexistent health care. Similar experiences of dehumanization and discrimination push PEH away from homeless shelters and care management. The weight of the homeless label often strips people of their identity, they often cite feelings of “just being a number” (Canham et al., 2024). Stigma persists even when PEH attempt to improve their circumstances. Discrimination by employers and landlords preferentially exclude homeless people with minimum income requirements, reliable references, and assumptions about drug use (Canham et al., 2024).

The cumulative experiences of these negative interactions are traumatic in their own right and actively keep PEH unhoused—drastically increasing likelihood of early death (O’Connell, 2005). But stigma also revives childhood traumas that precede and often cause homelessness.

According to one meta-analysis, almost 90 percent of PEH have experienced at least one Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs)—characterized by various forms of abuse, neglect, or family dysfunction experienced in early life (Liu et al., 2021). More than a third of PEH have experienced sexual or physical abuse in their lifetime (Liu et al., 2021). Given their prevalence, ACEs are understood as an indirect cause of homelessness, thus the invisible factors of trauma contribute heavily to the visible result of homelessness. Furthermore, parents that experience ACEs are very likely to pass them on to their children; trauma is intergenerational and thus cyclical (Narayan et al., 2017).

The trauma felt in childhood and revived in adulthood through structural, interpersonal and internalized stigma keeps individuals unhoused and predicts a similar fate for their children.

These revelations present us with two opportunities for breaking the cycle and address the invisible causes of homelessness. First, targeting stigma at its ideological root by acknowledging Asset Citizenship can foster whole person care solutions. Housing First and the Social Determinants of Health as concepts are manifestations of Positive Freedom in action. Second, to address trauma, prioritizing the mental health needs of PEH and children currently experiencing ACEs (Canham et al., 2024). This strategy highlights the importance of clinical social work, a specialty of Seattle University, as a vital care modality for PEH.

Housing First is a rehousing model that understands shelter as a foundation for human flourishing (National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2025). As a reaction against sobriety and employment requirements for housing, Housing First (HF) seeks to quickly and permanently place unhoused people into a residence while supporting their health care, recovery, and employment needs. Similarly, the Social Determinants of Health (SDH), recognize housing, along with liveable income, food security, and access to quality education as determinants of physical health (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, n.d.).

However, structural stigma against PEH and other vulnerable communities hamstring efforts to implement HF and SDH. Lack of funding often leads to incomplete fulfillment of Housing First tenants, leaving out substance use or mental health support. Funding and lack of housing are consistent carriers for HF programs (Greenwood et al., 2013). In San Francisco, for example HF has not successfully reduced homelessness despite spending over 20 billion on the project (GrowSF, 2025). Lack of emphasis on recovery and mental health services to complement housing meant PEH weren’t supported adequately to achieve stable housing status.

California is applying SDH by using state Medicaid funds for whole-person care— including provision of housing (Schneidermann & Villegas, 2025). This effort is challenged by siloed care providers and differences in payment structures between community based organizations (CBOs) and Medicaid providers (Schneidermann & Villegas, 2025). In addressing trauma through clinical mental health support, interventions are most effective when timed with release from an institution and combined with active outreach, case management, and housing (Hwang et al., 2014). The effectiveness of whole person care and the challenges faced by HF also apply to this intervention point.

Although some obstacles to solutions are practical, many, such as lack of funding, are centered in structural stigma towards PEH and related communities. The source of stigma is our persistent tendency toward dispositionalism, and more abstractly our belief in Negative Freedom. Programs attempting to jump-start asset citizenship for PEH through institutional care are hopeful but the resistance is stiff. If we are to effectively combat homelessness, we need to address our beliefs and the cruelty they create.

References

Berlin, I. (1969). Two Concepts of Liberty. In Four Essays on Liberty, Oxford University Press.

Black, M. (2020, July 23). This is Not a Good Start | Million Dollar Comeback Day 1. Mike Black. https://youtu.be/LJY9ruwZ8Jk?si=o0GgZKaHEoLB-k6G

Canham, S. L., Weldrick, R., Erisman, M., McNamara, A., Rose, J. N., Siantz, E., Casucci, T., & McFarland, M. M. (2024). A scoping review of the experiences and outcomes of stigma and discrimination towards persons experiencing homelessness. Health & Social Care in the Community, 2024(1). https://doi.org/10.1155/2024/2060619

Carter, I. (2021, November 19). Positive and negative liberty. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/

Greenwood, R. M., Stefancic, A., Tsemberis, S., & Busch-Geertsema, V. (2013). Implementations of Housing First in Europe: Successes and challenges in maintaining model Fidelity. American Journal of Psychiatric Rehabilitation, 16(4), 290–312. https://doi.org/10.1080/15487768.2013.847764

GrowSF. (2025, April 15). How San Francisco built a homeless system that fails its most vulnerable. Research. https://growsf.org/research/2025-04-14-sf-homeless-system-fails-vulnerable/

Hwang, S. W., & Burns, T. (2014). Health interventions for people who are homeless. The Lancet, 384(9953), 1541–1547. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(14)61133-8

Johnstone, M., Jetten, J., Dingle, G. A., Parsell, C., & Walter, Z. C. (2015). Discrimination and well-being amongst the homeless: The role of multiple group membership. Frontiers in Psychology, 6. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00739

Jones, M. M. (2015). Creating a science of homelessness during the Reagan era. The Milbank Quarterly, 93(1), 139–178. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-0009.12108

Lee, F., Hallahan, M., & Herzog, T. (1996). Explaining real-life events: How culture and domain shape attributions. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22(7), 732–741. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167296227007

Liu, M., Luong, L., Lachaud, J., Edalati, H., Reeves, A., & Hwang, S. W. (2021). Adverse childhood experiences and related outcomes among adults experiencing homelessness: A systematic review and meta-analysis. The Lancet Public Health, 6(11), 863–847. https://doi.org/10.1016/s2468-2667(21)00189-4

Narayan, A. J., Kalstabakken, A. W., Labella, M. H., Nerenberg, L. S., Monn, A. R., & Masten, A. S. (2017). Intergenerational continuity of adverse childhood experiences in homeless families: Unpacking exposure to maltreatment versus family dysfunction. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 87(1), 3–14. https://doi.org/10.1037/ort0000133

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Health and Medicine Division, Board on Population Health and Public Health Practice, Policy and Global Affairs, Science and Technology for Sustainability Program, & Committee on an Evaluation of Permanent Supportive Housing Programs for Homeless Individuals. (2018). Appendix B, The History of Homelessness in the United States. In Permanent Supportive Housing: Evaluating the Evidence for Improving Health Outcomes Among People Experiencing Chronic Homelessness. essay, National Academies Press (US).

National Alliance to End Homelessness. (2025, March 10). Housing first. Toolkits and Training. https://endhomelessness.org/resources/toolkits-and-training-materials/housing-first/

O’Connell, J. J. (2005). Premature Mortality in Homeless Populations: A Review of the Literature, 19.

Padgett, D. K. (2020). Homelessness, housing instability and Mental Health: Making The Connections. BJPsych Bulletin, 44(5), 197–201. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjb.2020.49

Phelan, J., Link, B. G., Moore, R. E., & Stueve, A. (1997). The stigma of homelessness: The impact of the label “Homeless” on attitudes toward poor persons. Social Psychology Quarterly, 60(4), 323. https://doi.org/10.2307/2787093

Reilly, J., Ho, I., & Williamson, A. (2022). A systematic review of the effect of stigma on the health of people experiencing homelessness. Health & Social Care in the Community, 30(6), 2128–2141. https://doi.org/10.1111/hsc.13884

Schneidermann, M., & Villegas, J. L. (2025, October 6). How medi-cal is tackling homelessness through Innovative Housing Solutions. Behind the Headlines. https://www.chcf.org/resource/how-medi-cal-tackling-homelessness-innovative-housing-solutions/

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (n.d.). Social Determinants of Health. Healthy People 2030. https://odphp.health.gov/healthypeople/priority-areas/social-determinants-health

Water Wars

2026-04-22T02:14:00Z

The ocean rhymes

With the words

That it creates

Orphan waves

And its skin

Opposite

Its form

The flood is

Allowing us

Passage on its back

The waterland is

Revolting

With its swell

Against

Riven victory

The swell goes back

The rivelets plunge onward

The ocean rhymes

In violence natural

Mirror to our

Tragic holy

Mortal

Glory Bound

2026-04-22T02:14:49Z

Glory bound

On a missed connection

Four faces to the wind

Three of then have their eyes close

But one

One of them sees

One of them has their eyes open

When everything else

Is Obliterated

By the storm

One speaks

One smiles

Lights of Love

2026-04-22T02:20:42Z

A shattered horizon

Laid before me

In pieces of green

Latern light scattered

In a broken line

Above

The sleeping eye of

The moon hung lidded

But alive

And out of the dark

A voice said those green

Studs beaming mystery

Across our bow

Are ships

Made for squid

They were predators

With stomachs thousands of miles

Away

but hungry for dozens

And waiting

Like angler fish of the open air

The great hunters

Used beauty to attract

Emerald fatale

I saw too the quieter lights above me

With no agenda

None other than to

Whisper us secrets from

the godhead

When it isnt looking

And I wondered what other

Beautiful predators

Lay patiently amongst

The dim furniture of my life

Amidst the wind and wave

What painful death beacons

From above

Stirs me from my slumber

Promising the posterity

Of day

What horror await the

Million hopeful hearts streaming

Up at dead midnight

To a false morning

I understand the squid

For i am drawn to my beautiful death

Even while

I know the jaws that might devour me

They might call me tonight

Common Sense

2026-04-22T02:23:57Z

The morning was blessed

Tucked into the tiny elbow

Of the world

My friends Oscar and Jacqui had

A home

It had mystery in the basement

There was love in the courtyard

Shouted up the banisters

And seeping inside the cedar shingles

Love

In the most common sense way

In the 9-5 way

Love

Oscar doesn't know what

His life asks of him

Jacqui from the safe coop

Of knowing

Helps as she can

Oscar has a problem

And the current state of things

Will kill rosy dreams

Yet Unfolded

Delicate

The question hangs around him like a fog

The ions of the question

Drawing his vision

Past his hand

Full of his lover

And his lap

Good with cat warmth

He looks for what must be

to allow tender

Dreams to grow knotty

And strong in the ground

The porch is lousy with golden

Light and he is happy as hell

And the question

Draws him out

The happiness and the quest rapt

In conflict

And good friends laughter to

Quell their sting

The place was full of good love

Easy love

Common sense love

And that was the truth that

Was asking something of

Him

Asking him to find earth for it's roots

And hearth for the children

Love comes in many forms

And they make sense

Though never

Through a telescope

The tale

2026-04-22T02:29:00Z

Ere a cloud behind the window pane

Underneath the blinds

Turned to reveal treasures

The sorrow in a blue sky

Was put there by me

And the horrid pine tree

There under

Only I

Am the author of

My soiled face

Yet where

Can I be found

Where on earth

Are the other aliens

The ones who don't belong

From another place

Beyond the sullen sky

Who dream of tear drops

Larger than all the land combined

And frowns as grand as

A horizon

I want to be their friends

Climb inside their tectonic sobs

So deep and long

They sound like summer thunder

I'm having trouble picturing them

All that rumbles are

Far off fighter jet poising

For war

Screaming into the free air

I'm waiting for the aliens now

To let their tears drop

Low and mighty onto

The land

And wash our filthy hair

Lighten my dreadful looks

At the coattails of spring

Let them come

Or perhaps they already have?

Maybe sea, salty and deep

Is their refuge

An abode for all those exiles of joy

I am an ostrich

Sized according to my

Ability to smile

But ho!

I have no lips for that

And down my neck goes

On the red groove

Below the ax

Shining and brilliant

With the "pursuit of happiness"

Incribed on the spine

Never has a man so finely whittled a cage

Around himself

Made of wood

Hung with Jasmine and pearly fruit

And called it natural

A jungle untamed

Indeed my wildness is the ax

Used for carving and killing

It was the gift of a demon king called

Joy

And he told me to let it take care of me

Let it be my weapon in the cruel night

Unleash it's power upon the void

Lashing out paradise from the shadow

He said it would

But it did not

No it only shined the sun into my eyes

And told me it was light

It cut into the old tree and proclaimed

Itself strength

It weighed on my hands so strongly

But it said it was balance I needed

To stay upright

Lies

And the demon joy laughed

As I twisted and fell in the dark

As I cried for help

With my hands stuck deep in the hickory

And when I finished my cage polished and lacquered

I sat down

And wondered what my next quest would be

I called to the king but he didn't answer

I called for my mother but she had died while I was away

I called for my sibling but he was trapped too

In a silicon manger

He yearned to be with me but he hadn't the strength to leave his padded home

I called into the night and heard many replies

Mistaking them for birds I sat down

And looked for my old friend the ax

I found it bent

And rotten at the hilt

A girl so small

Crawled from the wood and offered me her hand

I took it and she grew monsterous and black

Hairy and toothen she broke the ceiling of my wooden cage and let in some terror

She hissed and menaced me but

All I could stare at was the glorious stars

Behind her

She salivated and threatened death but I just laid on my back and remembered the sad sky

And the aliens id hoped to meet

I saw their sad faces brilliant in the air

As she attempted to rip me to shreds I threw

The blade into the air and it

Stuck in her heart

Howling she deflated and turned

Into a rose

Beside her the blade became a penny

I took it to buy a pale to take the alien tears to the flower and nurse it into strength

The cage broken

Is now a home with a door

I walk out to greet the glorious morning

Heartbreaking as it is

I know I put it there

Glad for it

I sit on the stump of the hickory and whistle

All of a sudden I hear more than the birds

My Friend the Raindrop

2026-04-25T05:26:47Z

There is hardly a drop of rain

that misses the earth

the one that does

must have gotten

lost in the woods

or leveled its eyes on the horizon and

aimed for the bright crack

closing after day

The drop of rain that hit me did neither

I kept it in my pocket

and it rode with me waiting to be

delivered down

past feet and sewer drains

to brown oblivion nested sweetly

beyond my pockets bottom

but I would not let it

I would not let it go to its death

but instead I held it in my hand

and asked it questions

about its grandfathers and its murky past

and how many times has it passed through the

eye of a lover

the rain drop quivered and said

something that couldn't be explained

the rain drop said

Stopping the fall, makes myths into men

but falling with purpose makes men into myths.

I couldn't wait any longer so I

prayed for the rain

so when the drop

was dropped

he wouldn't have the pain

of being alone

and when the thunder clouds broke

on a dark dawn in may

I went out from my room and

prayed that the clouds would go away

In fact they did and when it got warm

the drop began to shrink and i could see it needed

something to drink to keep its form

I gave him a tear

that way I had an answer to my eariler question.

He quivered again and told me

something inexplicable

terror subsides never at daytide

but in the quiet of closed eyes

calm is never in silence

but in the din of welcomed things

I knew it was true so

I prayed once more the rain

but it hailed and I caught his brother

a hailstone the size of a pea and

joined with he

so he didnt get any smaller

Somehow, he quivered in thanks and said

Sorrow rests on the banks

of a corpse that never quite walked

gratitude grows from mouth of

crows that never learned to talk

I never heard a sentence so strange

so I set down a page to record what he had said

he ask silently for peace

and with great grief

i let him roll down my palm

and out of the window

screaming in delight he

soared in flight and turned to miss the earth again

I hope when this letter I send

I'll see my old friend

refusing the fate in the earth

hes made of tears and ice

and smacks of christ

as he flys up to the sun again

I saw him die or maybe he flied

I couldn't say for sure in the storm

But i could hear a quiver of thanks

as he rolled on his flanks

into the jolly white squall.