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Do Not Go Gentle: Poetry and Prose
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1977
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 1, 2019
We have peace in our lives
Together or apart
Alone or with our wives
That we can stop our whoring
And pull the smiles inside
And light it up forever
And never go to sleep
My best unbeaten brother
This isn't all I see”
William Oldham “I See a Darkness”
At an Arizona State maximum security prison, a series of writer’s workshops between 1973 and 1975 produced these insightful poems from condemned men restricted in everything but imagination. As the director Richard Shelton reminds us “it is easier to curse the darkness than to light the candle which might be found in one’s own pocket”. Some have profundity, or simplicity, or humor or blistering intent. But they are original and gave these men an opportunity to reconnect with our bigger human family, for any willing to hear.
What impressed me so much about these poems were all the imagery of nature. Horses, stones stepped on in rivers, eagles with feathers of rainbow, and the sun’s lemon knuckles. The imagery is arresting when you imagine the limited grey-tonal cell blocks they spent their time in.
One of my favorite poems was “Rust” by Michael Hogan, where he ponders how the little amount of moisture in the Arizona desert has begun to rust the bars in his cell, and searches beneath his bed for a mushroom. The physical imprisonment make it’s way into the poem, but the greater beauty envisioned shines through. The solitary conditions makes it’s way into J. Charles’s Green’s “Isolation Cell Poem”, but he ends it with the life affirming statement “just supposing the air could speak again which of us would first bite our tongues asking forgiveness of of the other?” (p.26).
Ribald humor makes it’s way in too. Danny Laurino’s “At the Gates” is a four line poem that states “All things come to him who waits: $100 dinners on silver plates.Tomatoes come in wooden crates and the man in prison masturbates.” Lonnie L. Landrum’s biting critique of institutional racism is particularly pointed in “Another Commerical”. He writes “Amerikkka. The beautiful. Has a funky. Breath. Listerine. Keeps. Her mouth clean. But. How she gonna. Wash. Her nasty. Polluted. Ass?” (p.46).
Maybe what inspires me most of the collection if the reaffirmed belief that we are never beyond saving. There is something deeply wrong and inhumane about putting human beings, or really any animal, in a concrete confinement for their lives. The prison/industrial complex is becoming increasingly central to the growth of the U.S. economy, prisoners are a crucial part of building effective opposition to the transnational corporate agenda (https://www.globalresearch.ca/prisons...). This isn’t to say these men haven’t committed monstrous acts. Only to say that we all fall short and we all deserve the opportunity to create and share our stories. This collection represents flowering beauty of fallen men, with hopes and regrets that I find myself deeply moved by.
Together or apart
Alone or with our wives
That we can stop our whoring
And pull the smiles inside
And light it up forever
And never go to sleep
My best unbeaten brother
This isn't all I see”
William Oldham “I See a Darkness”
At an Arizona State maximum security prison, a series of writer’s workshops between 1973 and 1975 produced these insightful poems from condemned men restricted in everything but imagination. As the director Richard Shelton reminds us “it is easier to curse the darkness than to light the candle which might be found in one’s own pocket”. Some have profundity, or simplicity, or humor or blistering intent. But they are original and gave these men an opportunity to reconnect with our bigger human family, for any willing to hear.
What impressed me so much about these poems were all the imagery of nature. Horses, stones stepped on in rivers, eagles with feathers of rainbow, and the sun’s lemon knuckles. The imagery is arresting when you imagine the limited grey-tonal cell blocks they spent their time in.
One of my favorite poems was “Rust” by Michael Hogan, where he ponders how the little amount of moisture in the Arizona desert has begun to rust the bars in his cell, and searches beneath his bed for a mushroom. The physical imprisonment make it’s way into the poem, but the greater beauty envisioned shines through. The solitary conditions makes it’s way into J. Charles’s Green’s “Isolation Cell Poem”, but he ends it with the life affirming statement “just supposing the air could speak again which of us would first bite our tongues asking forgiveness of of the other?” (p.26).
Ribald humor makes it’s way in too. Danny Laurino’s “At the Gates” is a four line poem that states “All things come to him who waits: $100 dinners on silver plates.Tomatoes come in wooden crates and the man in prison masturbates.” Lonnie L. Landrum’s biting critique of institutional racism is particularly pointed in “Another Commerical”. He writes “Amerikkka. The beautiful. Has a funky. Breath. Listerine. Keeps. Her mouth clean. But. How she gonna. Wash. Her nasty. Polluted. Ass?” (p.46).
Maybe what inspires me most of the collection if the reaffirmed belief that we are never beyond saving. There is something deeply wrong and inhumane about putting human beings, or really any animal, in a concrete confinement for their lives. The prison/industrial complex is becoming increasingly central to the growth of the U.S. economy, prisoners are a crucial part of building effective opposition to the transnational corporate agenda (https://www.globalresearch.ca/prisons...). This isn’t to say these men haven’t committed monstrous acts. Only to say that we all fall short and we all deserve the opportunity to create and share our stories. This collection represents flowering beauty of fallen men, with hopes and regrets that I find myself deeply moved by.
October 27, 2014
"if you would work one small miracle
repair one man
without violence or contempt
assemble one body
without leaning on the grotesque
inventions of pain"
"if I could understand they mystery of rain
how it holds its dignity
in the violence of a storm..." Paul David Ashley
Loved this book of poetry by prison inmates.
repair one man
without violence or contempt
assemble one body
without leaning on the grotesque
inventions of pain"
"if I could understand they mystery of rain
how it holds its dignity
in the violence of a storm..." Paul David Ashley
Loved this book of poetry by prison inmates.
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