Prisoner of Poetry
Being in prison there always seems
to be a distraction to take
your mind from positive reactions.
What does it mean to be an
incarcerated poet? Or what does
it mean to have the creative ability
running through your veins with nothing
but time on your side? I wouldn’t
say that there is one that enjoys
prison, but taking advantage of
prison, to the creative mind is doing
time and sitting.
Gang affiliation, street chatter, and
misery’s company lurking in the yards
which have become the poet’s streets,
looked deep, from pacing through ones
own regard.
The mind of the creator while in prison
seems to expand by the minute. The
soul now has limitless places to dwell.
Even the poet can get caught up in
the gossip of the gift gabbing’s hell.
Each work of art that is created
becomes the poet’s child
the past nurtures, and raises that child
to become the perfected, mirrored image
of his own creative, imaginative spirit.
There are many obstacles that come through-
out the day of doing time. There are
many things to accomplish in the limitless
amount of hours. Even still the poet’s
creativity will bleed on the lined
paper, with the ink of the modern
day’s pen. It is destiny taking place
on its finest time schedule. It is
fate at the heaven’s gate, that makes
another to see what this poet views
as his place. For the soul must be
fed, just as well as the physical must
eat. New inspiration creeps to the seat
of the poet’s feet. It is not gracefully
acquired inspiration. For this poet’s environment
is perfectly trained with evil. There
are more poets lurking beneath the
prison’s intellectual atmosphere. Some that
have been seen and some that are kept
concealed until their harvest has ripened.
Truly amazing is the energy when a poet’s
harvest has ripened. Craft sharpened and
tightened to the highest observer’s liking.
A gift and a curse, to be the prisoner’s
poet. For once he finds out his gift is for
all, he must show it.
All of the depression, anxieties, anger,
stress, and pain are the tools that
the poet uses to create his works of
art. This poet sees that he is rich
in creativity. For the oppression alone
is one of life’s greatest stories to tell.
The poet let’s his emotions out through
his poetry, for no door of zeal shall
be shut, if the poet speaks openly
unlocking drastic measures of success’s
success, for one has had multiple dreams
of being great, fulfilling life’s test.
Might guess? Might rest? Might less?
The opposites of knowing for sure that
the poet’s crown is for sure.
Those things seem to be the poet’s greatest
fears. Through tears, changes of gears,
in life’s vehicled spheres, the poet
has learned to overcome the influences
of prison’s evil-tainted peers. To keep
the inspiration lit and full of flames is
the task of keeping the poet sane.
Written pain, to cleanse the incarcerated
stain, seems the same as a fruitful
gain.
End Mass Incarceration
Alexander Gallet is a currently incarcerated poet serving a first-degree natural life sentence due to the joint venture theory. He is a student in the Emerson Prison Initiative, a degree-granting program for incarcerated people in Massachusetts.
Image: Krakograff Textures/Unsplash