Pentridge Prison Reflections

‘I wouldn’t have trusted,’ she said

about friendships I made

in the poetry workshops in prison.

‘I grew up with criminals,’ she said.

‘They were all charismatic!’

The thing is, my guys weren’t.

To me, they were just poets. 

I didn’t think to judge anything else.

Seeing that, they trusted me.

But later, when some got out?

I found there were those who did 

have a criminal mentality.

Then, the friendships dwindled

in quiet, regretful agreement.

Others, though, did not.

Inside the prison 

there was no way, nor reason

to know the difference. In there, 

we all – inmates and tutors –

shared the prison mentality.

Written in response to dVerse Poetics: Folsom Prison Blues, where we were invited to be inspired by Johnny Cash's song of that name. 

My books (memoir and poetry) about the Pentridge experience are soon to be on Amazon.

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