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| Image source: The Sentencing Project |
Prison has replaced the plantation
Pick him up for loitering
Handcuff him for a driving offense
Jail him when he can’t pay his fine
Harass, kick ass so he knows his place
Young men rant in solitary
Molder for penny-ante crimes
Or felonies they didn’t commit
In private prisons
Profitable enterprises
The public chooses not to see
The bullet has replaced the rope
New York, Saginaw
North Charleston, Cleveland
Sanford, Milwaukee
Amidou Diallo, Trayvon Martin
Walter Scott, Dontre Hamilton
Tamir Rice, Milton Hall
Black bodies in their own foyers
Chalked on sidewalks
Slumped in stairwells
Bodies sprawled in city streets
Cheap lives, death at a discount
Phyllis Wax writes on a bluff overlooking Lake Michigan in Milwaukee, WI. Her work has appeared in many anthologies and literary journals, both online and print, among them Out of Line, New Verse News, Verse Wisconsin, Ars Medica, Naugatuck River Review, Your Daily Poem. When she’s not writing you might find her escorting at a local abortion clinic.