A Year in Prison
At the risk of beating a dead horse... 
Yesterday I posted journal excerpts (from Meditations and Improvisations) I wrote in a prison chapel on Christmas of 1997. For more context, and because I have neither the time nor inclination this evening to write about newer things, here are a few more previously unseen random excerpts from that book. Then I'll break from the year for a while, if you'd like.
Ameri-cuss
4 May 1997
8:15 a.m.
Big Brother
Is big business
Police and prisons
Pick up where the military left off
As the next big economic boon
And I cannot always distinguish the line
Between a pig
And the pork he gorges on
* * *
16 June 1997
4:35 p.m.
Biting your tongue
the insides of your cheeks
prisoners of war
Nervous habit
Half unconcious
compulsion
Please don't bite your tongue
Unless it first
bites you
* * *
30 June 1997
4:50 p.m.
Financing Montel
Hazing
Hosing
Hailing the wrong taxicab
Light in the closet
Blood on the hanger
In the hangar Montel
Losing focus
Hocus Pocus
And who is corn holier
Than cow
* * *
2 July 1997
4:15 p.m.
Gravel and black dust
Baked by the sun
In a round metal wheel
Where an inmate runs
Dark blue pants
Bare tattooed chest
By the horseshoe pits
An inmate suns
A water bottle break
Nibble of alfalfa
Looking out
And the homesick gerbil returns to his wheel
* * *
5 July 1997
4:45 p.m.
Pungent aroma
Of coffee beans
Chlorine
And time
Fills the nostrils
Tickles the lungs
Stirs the brain.
* * *
16 September 1997
noon
How many cunts
Could a good count count
If a good count could count cunts?
* * *
19 September 1997
4:05 p.m.
See?
I told you I
Could fly like a
Kite
A
Soaring kite
A
Diving kite.
Oh
God do I have to crash?
* * *
27 September 1997
8:45 p.m
I try to understand
For a splinter of time
The heavens were opened
And I saw God
For a splinter of time
The wind was your breath in my ear
An angelic song
Warm clear stream
And radiant sun
I then knew God alive
And you his soul
His charming spirit
Made me alive
For a splinter of time
Enchanted
Strung out
Undone
Then you vanished
So I pray for day
And try to understand.
* * *
15 October 1997
6:10 p.m.
I am so lonely
It's making me angry
I long for a soul mate
And there is none
I long for a princess
Or even a prince
I met one for a moment
But none since
I must grow old
But I hope not bitter
Sometimes
I fear
I am little more
Than litter.
* * *
22 October 1997
1:20 p.m.
Clash with
Licentious
Attitudes,
Survive the
Holocaust,
Land the lead role
On off-Broadway,
Nose your way
Diligently through
Onslaughts of
Non-thinking
Coarse, un-
Allusive, follow-the-
Leader
Liberal-hating
Imbeciles, deny them
Nourishment and smile as
Gnawing hunger consumes them.
* * *
14 November 1997
11:15 p.m.
Why are we giving the weeds of the world more compost?
* * *
27 November 1997
2:40 p.m.
Your hollow cheeks
Your luscious lips
Your dainty nose
And enchanted hips
Your nasal voice
Your tender hands
Your charms
The ocean's hallowed sands
I long to wash ashore
I long to long for you more
* * *
21 December 1997
11:35 p.m.
I am alive
I'm here
The circles beneath my eyes
Betray my home
And I can be whole
In this hole
Or out
* * *
22 December 1997
7:35 p.m.
rise and
Eat a
Valise
Of hard
Luck and
torment
* * *
27 December 1997
12:05 a.m.
Remy Martin
How I long to
Yearn to
Drink you
With my soul
Like so much coffee
'Til I'm light-headed
Ecstatic
Erratic
Automatic
* * *
9 March 1998
2 p.m.
Into myself into life into books
Into summer and teachers and bored dirty looks
When the board dirty looks at me
Leaves me to hang
Though the whole world's a savior
I feel the big bang
* * *
10 April 1998
1 p.m.
One beautiful moment
Outweighs by far
A lifetime of okay
I particularly like the counting cunt poem & pig pork eaters
big grins
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Hahahaha....
Thank goodness! - those were the ones I was afraid to post, lest they offend anyone.
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Could I use "one beautiful moment" & "how many cunts" in the next issue of thecitypoetry.com?
cheers
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Absolutely! I am humbled and honored that you'd even think of doing so.
Deeply I am....
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I loved all of these. I want to hear everything. I wish you could share it all, but, I'm sure you will in your book. It was so hard to pick a favorite out of these, but I picked, "Big Brother Is Big Business" I like what it has to say about money and power and how people get trampled by these. "I am so lonely it's making me angry" It really made me feel your forced disassociation from the kind of tenderness we all search for. My most favorite was "I am alive, I am here." It's so real and so honest. It is the voice of someone believing in hope, where many see no hope. Knowing how you so beautifully remained true to yourself, where so many would have lost themselves is amazing. There is something very special going on in your mind and your heart, and even in the face of what I would call a tragedy, You nurtured your true self. You not only nurtured it, you shared yourself with so many, embraced them in spite of their human frailties. You and your story are truly amazing.
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Thank you so much, Tara! Perhaps after I give every one a break from the old stuff, I'll revisit this journal. There is so much more in it - and it was hard to know what to post, though I tried to be random and not overthink the selection process... lol. I must admit there are a few things in that journal I'll probably never post. Of course I thought I'd never post the "cunt" piece, too - so I suppose you never know what will pop out in the future.
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"Big Brother
Is big business
Police and prisons
Pick up where the military left off
As the next big economic boon
And I cannot always distinguish the line
Between a pig
And the pork he gorges on"
sounds like you were fortelling the CheneyBush Beast regime.
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I not only love every word but love you for posting all this. I have your letters and know what you were going through in 1997-1998. This is not just poetry it is a cry for justice and a cry for hope and a cry for what the prison does to all of you guys that are innocent and cognizant. And I just am crying now thinking of it. I remember teaching in there and going out seeing the seagulls that came from Lake Erie who were on the grass inside flying up into the sky and thinking...they are free to fly. I am free to leave and those beautiful young guys are behind bars sleeping in cages in captivity. Oh my God, it still hurts when I think about it. I am not laughing tonight.
I am remembering a lot of things....like six more years and FOR WHAT? Your poetry touches something deep down inside and I can only say this, you are, were and will be the conqueror of your own existence. Love to you...
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Since I wrote that the military picked up where the police and prisons left off and now the police and prisons are back to picking up where the military hasn't yet left off.
Big Brother
Big bother
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I still can't imagine a mind like yours trapped behind bars? Just can't see it? Ten years? Don't you want to kill someone??? Starting with your 'lawyer'? Grrrr, sorry, so upset for the injustice perpetrated AGAINST you.
Hgs,
Suze
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I think my trial lawyer genuinely cared and did the best he could. But he was relatively inexperienced and had a bad case of the flu when the trial took place (since it had been put off a year and a half already, mostly because of the prosector, the judge didn't allow another continuance).
My appeals lawyers, on the other hand, were liars and swindlers. I never had the opportunity to meet them,
though... so they escaped my anger.
But that's a long story I'm working on for my book.
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Yes me. We might think of "cunt" in prison and pussies on the outside. God I'm so offended hahaha. What am I? Don't answer that John.
Those are very well done. I can only imagine what your state of mind was in at that time..
Kudos baby you are now amongst the.... ummmm, dare I say living?
Namaste'
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Risen from hell
And living to tell
Thank you, Shyloh! And I'm glad you have a sense of humor about it. I usually don't like the C word and much prefer the P word. But the C word does have a certain power and make a certain statement. And after all, words are only words - though sometimes they're much more. And sometimes I talk too much... lol... which is especially funny because I'm rather quiet and shy in person, in "real" life. Although I suppose the Internet is "real" too, in its fashion....
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Though you are a much better writer now these little poems say mountains about that first year. I can only imagine...and then not very well, how lonely and scared a man would be. I'm so glad you are the man you are today. I know it destroys many a man.
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Thank you, my friend!
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Sorry for posting so late on this blog. I'd read these offerings earlier when first posted but was too shy to comment on them along with everyone else.
I like that you've offered a years worth of thoughts and reflections here. Because that is what the are to me. I read thru them more than once and I guess what struck me most was the subtlety of the different moods that came thru at different times. It makes me think how amazing and how resilient the human heart can be sometimes... dealing with adversity. You have that kind of soul I think.... Resilient... it comes through in your writing.
I don't think I will say any more... though I could. Thanks for sharing these.
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Thank you, Chris! No need to apologize....
I very much appreciate your comment. Interestingly, there were even more moods that I didn't include. I was afraid to make the blog too long, lest it become tedious and people feel uninclined to read it all.
I could do another blog with all the other moods from that period and call it something like "Flip Side of a Year in Prison."
Maybe I will at some point.
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