Intro:
This poem
is my response to what I experienced after volunteering in a number
of facilities in the Michigan prison system during my time in the Prison
Creative Arts Project (PCAP) at U of M.I started teaching creative writing
classes to a group of juvenile sex offenders at Adrian Training School.
I was deeply changed and moved by what I learned in from the bright
young men (ages12-18) of Adrian Training School. That was where
my stereotypes about "criminals" were deconstructed; where
the line between perpetrator and victim began blurring; where my true
education of the prison system and its survivors began.

Jackson
Men's Facility (JMF) was the prison I began a workshop at my sophomore
year. JMF was a completely different experience from the small,
relatively therapeutic and familial environment of Adrian Training School.
One of the guards boasted to me that JMF was the second largest walled
prison in the country—it used to be the first. JMF houses a
huge population of men, the majority of whom are poor, Black non-violent
offenders.

Prison
abolitionists and scholars have done a lot of work to expose the social,
racial and economic roots of this phenomenon, labeling the prison system
our nation's "warehouse for the poor". Many have further
criticized the US's economic investment and dependence on our "prison
industrial complex", questioning why our government spends more
on the prison system than on the education system; spends more on incarcerating
our youth than educating them.

I
don't think I need to speak about the corrupt, routine, numbing process
of dehumanization I witnessed while I was there, where names become
numbers and individuality becomes dangerous, where men become metal.
I don't want to repeat the racist and degrading comments made towards
the men in our presence, reducing them to animalistic sexual predators
in the eyes of those trained to keep them down. I do not blame the guards
for doing their jobs. Like I said in the poem, they're "just
part of the machine" and therefore they "gotta keep it goin".

I
went back to JMF for a second year instead of moving onto another facility
because of the genuine relationships formed and progress made the first
year. Some of the same men returned and the writing quickly reached
depths it hadn't before- the men told fairytales, sang hymnals, spit
rhymes and spoken word, recited sonnets and haiku, touching on everything
from their childhoods to their children to the prison system to the
president to global issues to God and beyond. Once again, Monday nights
at JMF flew by fast. We were loud; we laughed, we clapped, we
hummed along and threw out beats. The guards kept a close eye- they
didn't like to see the men having fun, opening up, breaking down their
walls, reclaiming their names, their humanity. They didn't like
to see the metal melt.

One
guard in particular disliked my partner and I. She hassled us
regularly, telling us her concern was "for our own protection".
On our last day there, at the poetry reading every group puts on as
a final product of their workshop, she became flustered by the overwhelming
amount of visitors we brought for the show, the loud reaction each poem
received, and the overall interest invested in the men by their audience.
She rallied the guards at the end of it and rushed the visitors out
abruptly before we had our fifteen minutes to socialize with the inmates.
They banged on the glass, we walked away stunned. I didn't get
to say goodbye. I cried.

She
would later make false accusations against my partner and I. Because
of this, we were both officially banned from the Michigan Prison System
and the two men unjustly involved in the accusations were punished as
well. Not only am I unable to continue volunteering and/or working
in prisons here, but I cannot visit the men and women I know behind
bars, including my cousin, locked up for next thirty years or so.

And
so my education was cut short like so many with one final lesson: this
is what happens when the metal melts. Glitches in the machine are dangerous,
kinks in the fabric must be smoothed out. But we were just a small part
of the revolution going on in every facility created to further oppress
the oppressed. Long live the poets of JMF and every other prison in
this country, fighting with slit throats and cuffed wrists to be heard.
Fighting to be felt. Feel them, hear them, learn from them, spread their
stories, join their fight.

Article body:

---

Open Letter to the Michigan Prison System

When you
enter JMF,

You enter
through a metal detector first.

They gotta
know you're not coming with weapons.

Next, you
walk quick through the courtyard-

A sea of
orange jumpsuits and cigarette smoke

laughter
and cat calls, running laps, playing ball

there is
a rhythm to it, men lifting, pushing weights

thick arms
rising and falling, like it's a cotton field or a factory,

muscles
tearing and mending

hardening
is an art

the metal
starts on the outside and works its way in

from barbed
wire to cell bars to bar bells through rough skin

until it
reaches every muscle, every tendon

until you
become part of the machine

#984713

hardening
is an art

closing
is the key

which makes
opening feel like birth,

raw and
red, the deepest pain,

which makes
dreaming feel like danger

that goes
deeper than a shank can cut,

to that
soft spot, encased in cold iron,

untouched
for so long,

see, hardening
is an art

but opening
is far harder


my heart
is a metal detector.


It was a
line one of the men wrote in my first workshop

It is a
line I carry deep to help me remember

The men
who refuse to be reduced

Eastside,
Meachy, G, Savage, Spice, Edward, L, Richard, Henry X, Marvin,

Zeek,

2 years
at JMF taught me the sharpest blade of poetry


The last
night there left me with scars of my own doing

60 bodies
packed into one room to hear these men read

inmates
mingled with Ann Arborites, all moved to their feet by the writing,

thick air
sliced like lightning and lifted with laughter

each mouth
fully loaded with 32 teeth and a tongue ready trigger

we fired

#765284



I remember

The hands
of the blonde, blue-eyed guard who grabbed me

They were
heavy, tired

Like what
you doin here girl

Why you
busting my routine

I'm just
part of the machine but I gotta keep it going

They were
rough on my shoulder as she shoved me out the door

And locked
them in behind us, caged poets seething

Eastside
banged the window and yelled in disbelief

G just raised
a fist and laughed


#459583

My final
goodbye left them

Pressed
up against glass

Clawing
at the memory of freedom

As we, the
free, fled

Eyes red
with apology

For not
having more power

For not
being more than just a weekly visit

More than
glitch in the system


And when
you saw me woman,

Me, still
branded by your hand,

Me, the
damn glitch, the lil' bitch who'd never leave

Teary-eyed,
crossing courtyard

You grinned
to yourself and grimmed me hard,

Pulled me
aside and growled

"Girl,
don't you know, you not 'sposed to cry in prison"



No, you're
supposed to die in prison

#931260

Supposed
to shut down slow

Go cold,
broken furnace,

Go hard,
broken hearted,

You are
supposed to break in prison

Lift weights
in prison

better bulk
up cause you don't wanna be

scrawny
in the shower, everything is power,

#945382

you're supposed
to kill in prison,

Whatever
it takes to get him before you get got,

And if you're
gonna go you better flip the switch,

Be your
own death row so when they find you in the morning

you are
one less Black man for them to lynch and laugh at,

#732918

You are
supposed to forget in prison,

How to feel,
how to touch, how to flower

Forget your
family, your man, your woman, your passion,

Forget the
trees, the streets, the sun, everything is power,

Go numb,
go dumb boy, bend over bitch,

Yes, there
are many ways to do it,

but the
lesson is the same,

#563439

hardening
is an art

but opening
is far harder

you are
supposed to die

but you
never, ever cry in prison.

So what
happens when you decide to write a poem.

What happens
when 10 black men and 2 white women

Practice
the art of opening in prison

dream dangerous,
deeper than a shank can cut,

what happens
when the metal melts,

what happens?
Number 8-5-2 eh, 5-2 eh


The official
accusation claimed I said "I love you" to an inmate

you're not
supposed to love in prison, live in prison, give in prison

what happens?
Number 6-8-3, eh, 8-3 eh

The white
women get banned and black men get segregated to solitary

Their sentences
lengthened, while I walk free

The irony
in my punisment as heavy as her hand

And now
I wonder if it's more hurtful in the end

To flaunt
freedom in front of caged men


Dear Michigan
prison system,

you
are the bitter taste of iron in the back of my throat

But
the men you hold captive don't need me to be dangerous,

#1
seven-eh

Remember
Haiti, remember Harriet,

The
slave will uprise

You
will realize

The
hardest weapon of all is not a whip or a gun

It
is the tongue, taught trigger

It
is the muscle that tears and grows back stronger

It
is the heart when it speaks offbeat

I'm
number 6-8-3- eh, 83-eh, 83-eh

No?my
name is G, my name is Eastside, my name is Meachy,

This
name, your darkest nightmare, my brightest dream

This
poem a mine ready to take you in your sleep

See,
it starts on the outside and moves to the core

But my heart
is a metal detector

And I'm
not letting you through no more