Fair Freedom Found

This is the first poem that I wrote and finished after release from prison. It discusses those first sensations – that which free citizens take for granted – that I experienced in the relatively privileged community where I live. This will now be the start of a campaign to raise awareness about the problems in the UK prison system about which I and my family and friends were not aware until actually experiencing them. It is impossible to really understand the trauma suffered and the damage done to so many human beings without direct experience but, if we care about social justice, it is worth making an effort. Please subscribe to this channel if you sympathise, so that we can create some momentum. Who knows, with your support, someone in a position of power might actually listen!

Fair Freedom Found

Liberation; home at last

The fumes the feathers, the flora and fauna

Absent those senses in recent past

 Now mystery awaits round every corner

People on their way, to who knows where

The planes that roar above, in silent air

Now a comforting sound!

Fair Freedom Found

 

No screaming, no boom-box intrusion

Nor banging on mighty, metal doors

Alone, at peace, amid nature’s seclusion

No linoleum landings, nor filthy floors

No signs of others’ secretions

Though smelt in the woods, those dogs’ excretions

Let these animals abound!

Fair Freedom Found

 

These “good mornings” are pleasant greetings

Not of staff or inmates met everyday

Real happenchance meetings

 Of early risers on a well-worn way

I can almost walk where and when I desire

Through familiar smells of farm-waste fire

Footpaths all around!

Fair Freedom found

 

Commuters scurrying to the station

And the trains that take them on to the city

Monotony for them is, for me, revelation

Even they who were ugly may now seem pretty

I walked these streets some years before

Not knowing that they would mean so much more

Open spaces astound!

Fair Freedom Found

 

To walk, alone, surrounded by reality

That which every human should treasure

To greet each other without formality

A sense of purpose in the mere gift of pleasure

Inside we strived for any human dignity

Outside we are all of relative nobility

Let me kiss the ground

Where Fair Freedom is Found

 

I used to rise as early as I could

To find the peace to think, read or write

I ordered my life as any inmate should

To cope with deprivation, the daily fight

Nothing of value would we abandon

Outside this routine seems almost random

They lead to nowhere, these paths I now pound

Except, to that place where Fair Freedom is Found