No Release. (Poetry).

No Release

Horace Goddard


You call me brodah in dis cement slammer,
But dis steel's too thick to bind we togetha
I and I doing six years for a crime
The President of the United States made fine.

Cousin Bill tek him spliffde way to the Hill,
And conducted him foreign affairs with aplomb still.
Here my joints creak like steel in this cell.
While you join wid de man to wish I and I well.

True, I often smoke or sold a joint
while the biblical farmers reaped the harvest.
Dem drive dem Ferraris at de back o' mi yard,
And ask mi Muddah when I and I will be free.

Here, dem nab release Jab pe'ple.
No one-sixth or two-thirds images appear.
De maximum time is de full t'ing, Sar.
There is no kindness; all is fair in dis war.

I and I find it hard fi communicate with the man.
Muh island rhythms back wid a chupse of frustration,
And im seh me lost control in dis damn confusion.
Parole Board nuh lissen to we plea for leniency.

Dem seh dat de police seh dat all Jab's chillun dem
Belong to some nefarious gang, some J'can posse.
Rastafari believe that Jab in im glory mek we
Fi understan' dat dey is two kind o'mercy.

There's freedom with forgiveness and there's
Freedom with mental chains gridlocking we brains.
But I say, unlock the gates of these prisons and set we free.
Justice is the basis of Canadian democracy.

Horace I. Goddard is a Montreal writer. His most recent work is Paradise Revisited (a novel), Winston Derek Publishers, 1997.