They are not men
but ghosts in orange with
surly mouths and cornered eyes
shuffling in sixes to
the tune of guard boots
down corridors that
go nowhere,
forever and ever in this
world without end, amen,
ah men without world
such as men are made
by Canada in this
21st century of our lord,
here in our great white north
of born-again government
and human rights for all
except the right to be human
behind these walls.
I see them come
I see them go
when the hour is done
and ponder the sadism
of identical orange, this
vulgar brew of red and yellow
red for ritual election anger
yellow for the cowardice
of penal politics in these
pious poisoned times.
There is nothing here
but the nothingness of
two and three and four to a cell
eight by eight by twelve feet long
bad feel, bad words, bad dreams
the sweat, the heat,
the stench of animals
shitting microwaved food
down foul steel toilets
and never a glimpse of sun
or an honest inch of air.
Beasts live better than this.
Lights glare and cameras stare,
doors whir and click and clank.
Some nights I almost
run when it’s time to go,
guilty for washing my hands
guilty at noticing how beautifully
the moonlight falls
on the razor wire.
© 2009
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