INCARCERATION NATION

By Leilani Fu’Qua

There’s wonder out in the field How many million of us will die

Its cold out here at Night among us Bugs, Pigs and the stink of Mildew Grass. I sho’ wish I could move that Road Block, I wonder how long its gonna take us to pass?

I’ve always heard stories and even read a few about How my forefathers were slaves. But I was a child and never thought that slavery would exist up until today. I know nothing has changed, just time has passed by.

But still we must struggle and try. We must watch for the one’s who claim to be friends, and when we’re sleep they cut at our eyes. The one’s who say, when it Time to fight I wonder how many millions of us will die!

Nommo May 1993

If I told you the first time they held us in chains was not the founding of the first prisons in Massachusetts, 1785, If I told you they started as slave capturers hunting us down like animals just to lock us in cages again our bodies will bear it but our minds may not

If I told you the history of confinement is not one of convenience they did not ask where should we hold our lawbreakers? they remembered the hot boxes festering in the Southern heat used to punish slaves

If I told you the only way we could buy our way out is if we were bought

If I told you that we make up fourteen percent of this country but forty percent of your prisons

If I told you America is a Nation of Incarceration

Would you believe me?

October 1992