robert lilly

By Robert T. Lilly Every family has its secrets. Every secret has its harm. Every harm has its outcome. Recently, I have been exploring my family tree. Unfortunately, I can only go back so far, as my father never married my mother. And thus I was cut off from her side of the family, as…

By Robert Lilly We have just ended one year, and have entered into another. But where are we, truly? Are we in a better place? Or are we still coping with the challenges we faced last year, only upgraded by another year’s worth of suffering? I just completed my first official publication, a co-authored work…

By Robert Lilly If you were there, you would have killed him, too. Have you ever played that game with yourself, where you said to yourself or to someone else, “I wonder what I would have done if I were alive then?” Or, “If I were there, I would have done so-and-so.” And the truth…

By Robert Lilly I was first introduced to writing through the music genre called rap. I was a youth, in my early teens. I had just moved from NYC, the South Bronx, to Westchester, California. It was there, as a student at Orville Wright Jr. High School, that I wrote my first rhymes. I was…

By Robert Lilly I gazed at the face. I did not know this young person, although his name seemed familiar to me. It turns out he was the child of a person I knew. I was stunned – another case of a youth arrested for untreated mental illness. On this particular morning, I woke to…

By Robert Lilly Life is an incredible journey, filled with lessons at every turn! Eighteen years ago, I walked out of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for the second time after my third felony conviction. Little did I know, that journey would lead me back for a third stint, facing the daunting reality of…

By Robert Lilly I grew up thinking and believing that might equaled right. Then I began to live, and I learned that violence begets nothing but more violence. The places where I grew up were arenas of violence, and the streets taught us to be gladiators, using the world as our stage to prove our…

It was one decision. One moment. A single act that started it all. Like a pebble striking a still pond, it caused ripples I couldn’t control – ripples that would stretch across years, across lives. That decision led me to flee. That flight led to my arrest. And that arrest led to a prison sentence…

By Robert Lilly It is a travesty and a demoralizing shame to witness the way human lives are being played with, as if they were mere pieces on a chess board. The sickening videos being circulated, where we are witnessing ICE agents strip mothers from children, or small children walking with their adult parent, now…