Voices of the Incarcerated - Plexiglass

Chalkboard littered
with broken psalms
gang
emblems
stories
turn
the classroom into a lighthouse
show
how a pencil can be used
as a laser beam
to illuminate the scars
of those thrashing
about in the waters

In Plexiglass, a collection of intertwined poems, California author Margo Perin tells the story of how the prison industrial complex in the “land of the free” develops, evolves, and sustains by paying homage to the words of incarcerated men and women in the United States.

Perin, who has taught for more than thirty years, including M.F.A. and M.A. Creative Writing at the University of San Francisco and New College, at UC Berkeley Extension, California Poets in the Schools, and in the U.K., Mexico, and Italy, spent more than a decade teaching writing to men and women at San Francisco County Jail facilities and San Quentin State Prison.

Incarceration is being
caught in shark teeth
three rows pointing inward
no time off
for time served
no possibility of parole
another tooth pulling
each one of the men and women
closer to the throat
closer to being swallowed up

"What I witnessed inside San Francisco County Jail and San Quentin State Prison mirrors the reality of millions of people hidden behind plexiglass in our communities. I hope the voices in Plexiglass speak to you as they did me, and that the next time you drive over the Bay Bridge past the shiny gray building protruding from Seventh Street, those voices will not have been spoken in vain." -Margo Perin, on Plexiglass

You can watch the trailer for Plexiglass here.