Where we went in and wrote with prisoners
Many of whom were immensely talented
Their only defect – being caught
We noted how they learned criminality
By the living example of inmates and wardens
Who taught that a world of laws
Cannot stop crime, or even prevent recidivism
Giving only lip service to rehabilitation
More boredom and passive punishment random
To break the spirit of anyone dissenting
The politics of prisons is well known –
How they are America’s growth industry
Keeping young blacks under lock and key
And killing off some innocents regularly
Prisons do not change – only by degree
Writers inside are witnesses to this
They carry the seeds of stories like birds
Plant them on pages when the moon is right
And sing for the release of all of Light
Eye met mainly the uneducated behind bars
The rich can always afford more lawyers
Jails are de facto social welfare
It is a crime to be poor
When the rich own the law.
COPYRIGHT © 2005 THOM THE WORLDPOET
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