In Cardiff Jail



By PoetonaHill
- 5421 reads
In Cardiff Jail
In Cardiff Jail, grey dawn breaks on
razored walls and living-blocks of stone.
High barren landings amplify harsh slamming
gates, and emphasise the echoes of the
bosses' yells and rattled keys of doors that
only ever bang behind.
Alone I trudge the long dark tunnel of
my ''time'' – caged bird, spiralling inside the
wasteland of a mind with nothing gained and nothing left.
Pleasure is the hotplate stop for porridge slop
and morning shuffle round a yard with obscure
friend of bully-boy and baron – grass –
and those but barely sane.
Hear torment in the traffic roar. Is she
some minute blended part of that?
sharing lungfuls of this fitful breeze?
I flee from gulls that scream and soar and
laugh at me, - ''come see, we're free!'' –
and merge into my daily chore of sweep and swab;
then buff the polished floor amid the clanging steel
and shouts; dream my boredom; cry my shame;
or grind my hate and shift the blame.
Again, her ''Dear John'' crashes in my brain,
so blacking out some distant light.
For she's out there somewhere with him,
and I must stay within this wing of rusty bars
and bang-up cells, in my grey world of
yesterdays where tomorrow always
stays some distant unknown-life away.
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Comments
This is all brilliantly done,
This is all brilliantly done, but I especially liked the image of the gulls mocking the prisoner
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This has real atmosphere and emotion
Reading it out loud amplifies the feeling of empty dispair. Although you have set this in Cardiff prison it easily could be about the prison of lonliness or depression. Intense piece written at perfect pace.
Well deserved cherries.
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Is there nothing positive
Is there nothing positive that can fill the time, or is it that one has to have the motivation to get involved in any positive stuff? The bitterness of the loss of the girlfriend's waiting support is very telling, and grind my hate and shift the blame. Rhiannon
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You create such a powerful
You create such a powerful impression of how it might feel to be in prison, insightful and also full of narrative. Great piece.
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This wonderful poem makes me
This wonderful poem makes me appreciate my relative freedom - it's our facebook and twitter pick of the day! Do share if you like it too.
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yep. great stuff. I'm not
yep. great stuff. I'm not going to mention Oscar Wilde and Reading jail.
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A great piece. As well as
A great piece. As well as giving us the narrator's bleak present, we are presented with the question of how a life can be rebuilt after the prison time has ended, or if it can at all.
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Congratulations - this is our
Congratulations - this is our Poem of the Week!
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yes the gulls are free and
yes the gulls are free and the prisoner is locked up. Good poem.
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