Monday 31 December 2012

…from prison…

I wrote this poem one night, thinking about the light that illuminates the prison cell. You may never have been behind bars but you may have been imprisoned in the cell of isolation not solitude, desertion not retreat, anger not love, fear not confidence, despair not hope and servitude not service. Indeed, from prison have emerged some of the greatest characters in the world - Malcolm X, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Wole Soyinka and Angela Davis. You can make great your prison experience and come out as a great character to illumine the world...


… are you stranded…
… looking for the way…
… out of the prison cell…
… out of the mountain of torture…

… I was once a prisoner…
… maybe, I’m still one
… perhaps, not as heroic as Mandela…
… maybe, not as infamous as Anini…

… but from the cell…
… I garnered bits and pieces…
… of information to better my life…
… knowledge, no other place was to better offer me…

… in the cell…
… the prison guard stripped me…
… leaving me naked…
… as he sprayed tear gas in my windowless cell…

… branded as a felon…
… I suffered brutalities…
… and more than the cell’s indignities…
… I suffered desertion from my loved ones…

… indeed…
… in the cell…
… I was in the lone…
… and needed someone as a backbone…

… only few…
… few persons remembered the great years of yore…
… those were my soulful friends…
… who knew the virtue that took me to jail…

… day by day…
… as I pass through one ordeal or the other…
… I needed no philosopher to tell me that…
… that there’s a spiritual reality in the universe…

… I needed no one to tell me…
… I saw the lines of truth…
… buried deep in layers of history…
… that spirits dwell in bodies…

… it was from the cell…
… that I grew tall in understanding…
… the art of living…
… and from the most-dreaded, I became the most esteemed…

4 comments:

  1. That was a lovely poem Innocent; thank you for sharing it. I guess we don't need bars to imprison ourselves with our fears and doubts. But to be in such a dark and lonely place, even a glimpse of light, can give you hope. It takes only one person to believe in you - to give you the courage to look deep inside and find light, instead of darkness.

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    1. That's true Amanda, 'It takes only one person to believe in you - to give you the courage to look deep inside and find light, instead of darkness." Oftentimes, such a person is hardly found, but when found, joy comes to dwell in our hearts. I really do appreciate your support, wishing you a 2013 devoid of bars of all kinds... Cheers!

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  2. That's a great poem Innocent, and sure, we don't need bars to imprison ourselves....

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    1. I'm really glad you stopped by, thanks a great deal for you wonderful thought. Wishing you best this New Year!

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