About the Poetry Blog
The poets featured on this page are currently incarcerated, and many of them are in federal prisons far from home. Your feedback is a valuable source of motivation and connection to the outside community. These messages will be passed on directly to the author. Comments may not appear immediately on the site, as our team processes them to mail to the poets.
Click on the poem title to open it up, and then post your comments, feedback, and encouragement in the space below the poem.
Untitled
By NG
No clothes
No shoes
No lights
No food
Child being raised by a child
Leave struggles with no rules
So no school was the road
Stuck in poverty nowhere to go
Just another lost soul
They don’t care to help
So we don’t care to do whatever
Stealing cars and rob just to feel better
The cells in jail
Where they rather put us
Instead of getting us real help
We just a product of our environment
We just trying to make it
They just trying to take it
But we hold on stand strong
Like a knife going through fire
We become stronger after the fire
Pain could become a distraction if you allow it
Pain could also be strength if you use it right
No matter what keep your head high
At the end it’s always light
Biggest Fan
By DJ (Trey)
I would buy a ticket to your show,
Sit in the front row,
Stand up and cheer as you sing from your soul.
Catz may cry, dogs might bark,
but I’ll keep your ticket next to my heart.
If you was a dancer, I would pay for a dance even if you had one short leg.
I would keep my outfit in a Ziplock body bag, just to smell your fragrance.
If you paint, I would pose and buy them all at the art exposé.
I joke with you and laugh because Lord knows I got it bad.
I would pay top dollar for one more hit,
You are like a drug and my body wants its fix.
I got it bad, I got it bad, I know,
But can you sign these pictures, and say to my Biggest Fan?
This is Trey #3
New
By DT
I’m tired of the old where is the new
New year, New month, Same ol you
Nothing feels like new shoes
New love or a new car
Except new blues or a release date not too far
I’m tryin new ways for the same ol thing
It’s a new day, but the pain has the same ol sting
So I ask, is anything new under the sun?
Or do your present become your future
But was it new when it began?
Wait 4 Me
By AS
Wait 4 Me
Because I’m almost free
No more cuffs on my hands
No more shackles on my feet
No more waking up sad
No more crying to sleep
I’m tired of commissary bags
& stupid kiosk machines
I’m almost free
1 million things on my mind
Like when I leave out these doors
Ain’t no more count time
No more waking up 4 dimes
I’m tired of watching Fox 5
I’m on my way to R&D*
With a Kool-Aid smile
*Receiving & Discharge
You Beautiful People
By TT
Hatred to humility.
I can forgive humanity.
What you evoke is beauty…
Hopeless to optimistic,
Treatment to my heart’s sickness,
These people don’t hate me…
Doubtful to certain,
Love conquers all evil.
I truly adore…
You beautiful People.
My Mural
By DS
If I had the opportunity to design a mural mine would be a tribute to the mothers.
Mothers from all over the diaspora,
mothers from Africa, Brazil, the Caribbean, and the U.S.
The mothers on the mural are teachers, because mothers are our first teachers.
I would have Ida B. Wells, Maya Angelou, one of our strongest poetic voices.
Assata Shakur would be in the middle standing on the Globe.
She represents the struggle for freedom by any means necessary.
You already know the Free Minds women are on there
Along with the sistaz from Black Lives Matter.
Behind the Free Minds family would be the poem I know why the caged bird sings.
There would be faces you wouldn’t know because all mothers are important.
I would have Nina Simone and Billie Holiday and Lauryn Hill
Front and center. Nina and BIllie singing about strange fruit.
Lauryn telling us why you just lost one.
Meshell Ndegeocello can play the bass.
While Nikki Giovanni is explaining through her poetry why Tupac was important.
My mural is a living mural so I would like for it to grow
I would like to add more faces and poems.
We already call Earth Mother Earth, we call nature Mother Nature.
I believe if there is a God she’s a woman.
Women give birth to everything, the female aspect is the most important.
So my mural is about mothers giving birth to movements,
Important moments in history, art, science, and math.
Like the sistaz from Hidden Figures and the first black woman in space.
Most of all I want my mural to represent the strength and resilience
of our Mothers, our sisters, our Queens
How Many Angels?
By RL
Dear America
How many angels
gunned down
in schools
out shopping
dancing
dating
sleeping
living
loving
before heaven fills up?
How many hopes
choked to death
by murderous protectors
shot to death
by law enforcers
robbed of
all the unknowns the
what could have been’s
the future
before all that’s left
is to give up?
How many flowers
strewn on sidewalks
hollow promises
podium bombast
lonely dinners
empty arms
child sized coffins
before we wake up?
How many Angels
would it take
crying in
your
house
before you Stand Up!!!!
How
Many
Angels?
77 Minutes
By IS
For 77 min they waited to go inside
For 77 mins they waited to save their lives
Why?
Were their lives not that important?
Or was it just another tragedy and misfortune
‘Cause of the mishaps of police
Another 1000 years of mourning
‘Cause peace makers aint keep the peace
Why?
‘Cause it wasn’t your lives that was in danger?
The unarmed is killed in seconds
Active shooter killed hours later?
No hatred towards the police
Just hatred towards their decisions
A principal may have survived
But our principles are no longer living
I’m livid!
Thought Dear America grabbed your attention
Too many voices stating opinions
Nobody to sit and listen
Are we finished?
I’m talking about humanity as a race
For 77 minutes our heroes just stood in place?
No way!
And left children to a darkened fate
And left parents hearts filled with hate
Those are feelings they can’t escape
Mistake?
How many more do we have to make?
How many souls get snatched away
Before making America great…again?
Or was it ever?
Or was it all just an endeavour
To bring this country together?
And make falsehood look like the truth
‘Cause the truth, is January 6th was the biggest stage
For the revealing of the face
Of a country that’s set ablaze
Amazed that they couldn’t stop it
And for 77 minutes they sat and practically watched it
Ukraine is the trending topic while we are waging wars with ourselves
Throwing bodies inside a cell and strip millions of mental health
Then call it rehabilitation
Denial towards the facts that should prove we are mental patients
And patience is getting thin
‘Cause nobody ever listens to the mentals that needed saving
if you save a man’s mental
You probably can save a nation
Shave a couple minutes those children probably make it
77 minutes?
What’s the reason that kept you waiting?
Note: “Dear America” is a poem by IS that is featured in the Free Minds anthology When You Hear Me (You Hear Us).
Ode to My Daughter
By AHA
You bring joy to my life
You inspire me to become a better man
–that changed my life–
And become the best version of myself
Without you, joy would not have entered
So suddenly
When I needed it the most.
So this is why when I think of you,
Joy of my life,
I smile
Speak Your Truth
By AL
allow your words to define who you are through your actions!
and trust that I see you for you, because we are all trying to reach the same goal,
a perfect place to embrace amongst the multicolor of the rainbow.
like the north star you shine brightly. therefore cast your light to the voiceless
while striving to provoke change,
expressing gratitude, laughter and love in the presence of your own pain.
don’t be fierce in your quest for love and reject all forms of hate.
for tomorrow is not promised to us, so grab the spot light now or forever wait.
i can see the caterpillar transforming into a beautiful butterfly.
bare your soul to the world and allow life to be your only natural high.
let your spirit run wild through the fields of unlimited youth.
and each day as you become who you say you are, bravely speak your truth!
**a special dedication to the mysteries of the rainbow. happy pride month**