By Osaze Osayande

Brett Story's film, The Prison in 12 Landscapes, confronts one with the consequences of our present-day Prison Industrial Complex without ever taking the viewer within the walls of a prison. The film effectively challenges conceptual ideologies of where the grasp of the carceral system ends and highlights how prisons have discretely influenced a plethora of aspects of our society. The film challenges the viewer to imagine what our world would look like, independent of the carceral system's influence. In the St. Louis County landscape, viewers watch how the PIC upholds the power of racial capitalism and discriminatory policing, impacting the daily lives of Black Americans far outside of prisons- a theme this zine further explores.

By Stephen Mead

Who cut that hole in this fence of chain link,

gave such a hopeful opening

with any thorny barbs clipped off

so as to not poke, pierce, snag?

That space has the shape of a benevolent womb

and certainly an infant's or small toddler's passage

can be imagined, hands of protective carrying

meeting  a separate pair on the other side.

Here. Go now. Keep safe-----

By Bud Sturguess

A young boy coughs

and sputters something in Spanish

I don't know what he said

Maybe a border word

I only know my words, buzz words

Words to Tweet

By Russell Willis

Turns out, I knew it all along.

It was there, and not so deep within.

There, not lurking but waiting.

Waiting to be discovered…no…rediscovered;

knowing that it was true (or false) because,

turns out, I have a conscience.

I knew it even when I tried to ignore it,

pretending it was not, insisting it was not,

shouting that it was not, AND NEITHER ARE YOU!

By Lew Jones

And the time flew & danced in merriment like new June leaves

New Summer, new river, glimmering starlight in the flowing aqua

Glowing fragrant lilting rosemary dew –colors soon explode into view

I looked for the night I waited for the stars- to hold life in a royal embrace

By Robert Beveridge                                             

A threadbare forest in miniature.

He lines matchsticks up on the tabletop,

counts them out, compares

with the rest of his pack of Mavericks.

Seven of each, maybe a quarter more

if you count the butt he had to stuff

back in the pack because he couldn't

find a trash can.

By Stephen Mead

During shelling bodies rain, flood,

become dikes.

The siege seems epidemic.

Is it still the same war?

Water gurgles voices, bears meaning, drizzles up

as fog & the fog

forms blocks.

By S.G. Parker

(Medium Swing)

Birdland. A hot summer night. ‘Move.

Along.’ The white cop tells him. ‘Me?

For what?’ The man is well-dressed. Black.

He points. ‘See that sign up there? Miles

Davis. I’m playing inside—’ BAM!

Split head. ‘You’re under arrest!’ SLAM!

By Cruz Villarreal

Undismissed guilt, put away the hangman’s noose, my mother was dying and there was nothing I could do.

How does a man find redemption for the sins of the boy? He doesn’t. So, I live with regrets. They linger like the smell of rotting debris; no matter how many times I try to disguise the scent, it remains. Regrets over being powerless, regrets over ignorance, and regrets over poverty. I should have stayed home and done more. I ran away because I was tired of our way of life.

I left home at 18. I visit but never stay. Leaving was an attempt to escape misery, something the poor are rarely able to do.

By John Grey

(There was a time, back in the 50’s and early 60’s, when record albums by black artists, especially jazz ones, didn’t feature the performers on the cover. Often, in their place, would be some sultry-looking white woman.)

It's not sex

but a rare jazz record

tucked under the arm

comes close.

Besides,

what girl do I know

could live up to

the pretty white woman

on the cover.

By Russell Willis

It is without a sense of expectation that we come

No hope that guides or drives

No goal to reach, no job to do

Simply continue on our way as if the puzzle’s 

Solved the moment we arrive at where we’ve come

By Ali Ashhar

The horizon of fraternity

is overshadowed 

by the clouds of injustice

I conceive a disease that has swept

the nooks and crannies of the earth

a disease whose fatality knows no count, 

a disease whose vaccine is yet to be found

I open my eyes and witness 

By Hamish Todd

Before the thought is lost

And the blue ink smudges

Beyond recognition

On the temporal page

Every drop of light

Finds its way

By Cruz Villarreal

The bathroom mirror affirmed the innocence

of my ignorance.

The only color a child should see,

is reflected in the maple tree of fall

or the coral and pastel hues of roses in spring.

By Carlos Godinez

I Always Thought He Was A Cop.

A Real Cop.

The Polo Shirt. The Patch.

The Handcuffs.

The Squad Car.

He’d Take Me.

Take Me Often.

Red Lights, He’d Run.

Siren Blaring.

Lights flashing.

By James Hanna

It usually takes something drastic to upset a person’s life. An earthquake, a fire, or a hurricane could potentially do the job. But my life was foiled by an incident that could hardly be called dramatic. It was derailed by an eighteen-year-old kid who, upon spotting a middle-aged woman walking her dogs in a local park, patted his crotch suggestively and shouted, “Lady, this is for you!” It was the kind of event that more often occurs when women walk past construction sites. If the woman is even remotely attractive, men wearing hard hats and steel-toed boots will typically shout lewd remarks. But cries like “Hey baby, wanna share my bologna?” do not have consequences. Women will dismiss these bon mots with either a laugh or an icy stare.

By Christian Skoorsmith

It is quivering how far into the sacred hills the white man pushed

to carve his likeness into stone, a graven image if ever there was one,

unblinking eyes never wrinkled by joy, fear, hope.

Impossible for them to turn around and look

behind themselves. How forceful a monument can speak.

How true, when tongues are stilled.

By Kim Vaughn

“Guess who?” you had asked, again, hands over my eyes

a moment of joy, you felt, as I feigned surprise

it mattered to you, sage one, to be seen inside

an innocent game, you played, to nurture your pride

I wish you had known, my friend, that I loved your smile

the kids who teased you, sweet girl, were stupid and vile

you’re my first lesson, of grit, in this course called hate

I didn’t get it, oh no, I couldn’t relate

By Cheryl Caesar

I was stunned -- and I expect you were too -- to see busloads of immigrants dumped in front of VP Harris's house on Christmas Eve. Shivering in the DC cold, in t-shirts and shorts, as they had left Texas 31 hours before. The thin blankets they were given drape like robes, and all at once we can see the Holy Family seeking shelter. (The travelers had children and babies with them.) Or consider the Magi: they would never have made it to the stable were it not for the sacred laws of hospitality which compel us to shelter travelers and the homeless

(After Jericho Brown)

By Jeffrey Dreiblatt

Spring growth obscures my view of the harbor.

I lift a brick that crumbles my nails.

            I lift a brick that crumbles beneath my nails.

            Red oval prints of children’s fingers.

 We search grey bricks for children’s finger prints.

The silent wall of the cotton gin.

            The cotton gin wall at McLeod Plantation.

            A note said, You deserve a brick today.