Wednesday 11 March 2015

Poem from Death Row

The Row I’ve Hoed Bears Bitter Death

Sometime the rain falls and I’m never aware of it.
I’m sound-proofed from the world.
Cursed to witness but not participate.
Sometimes the sound of thunder is lost in the cacophony of shouting men,
Screaming their grievances to apathetic guards;
Their prayers to an indifferent deity.
The only time I hear the rain is when it leaks through the crack in the ceiling.
It’s the melodic symphony of water dancing off of the leaves or earth or man-made edifices.
No, this sound has more of a dull metronomic quality as it slaps the stone floor.
Each drop is a tiny defibrillator that shocks me back to reality;
The needle that pierces all my dreams.
After the rain has fallen I plug up the cracks in my concrete sky,
Shut off the light that became my fluorescent moon and stars and finally fall asleep.
This is where my life’s journey has taken me and dropped me off,
Like a child on the first day of school… kicking and screaming.
A ten by six cell where I play at being God.
Creating, destroying and rearranging and likewise, becoming indifferent to the world.
©Irving Davis

This poem was written some time ago by "my" Death Row inmate. I know my posts on this subject are unpopular, but do read it if you have a minute. He's a gifted and sensitive writer (btw I do have his permission to publish his work on my blog).

18 comments:

  1. Frances, it's not that they are unpopular it's more that you are doing your best to empathise with naughty folk. You I suspect vote Tory. Cameron goes out to Saudi Arabia and America. They are both so bad in the name of different religions that I can't condone it. Our Royals love the Saudis....Just before the last European War they were kissing Hitler.
    I'll never live to see the change to humanity, I'm too old to fight for it but for change blood must be let.

    PS. On a lighter note there is one lass I wouldn't mind being stoned to death. She bought me a present, a plastic Westie with light up eyes. Nearly gave me a heart attack last night when it's eyes lit up and started flashing.

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    1. Adrian, I have no political allegiance, and certainly not to the Tories at the moment. I feel quite insulted!

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    2. Sorry, really sorry. I Hate Christians and anybody else that doesn't think that life is sacrosanct. I worry a bit about the ones that do.

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    3. Life is definitely sacrosanct, and I'm a Christian. So I suppose you now hate me. Wat a shame....

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  2. I don't think your Death Row posts are unpopular. As far as I'm concernded, I always read them - I just don't know what to say, which is why I don't comment. Anything seems just so terribly banal in the face of something like that, and therefore, I better say nothing at all.
    Unlike Adrian, I am not convinved that each and everyone there has been doing something bad (and even if they had, the death sentence and the treatment of the Death Row inmates are not justified by it). Too many cases of unjust conviction have happened in the past, and are in all likelihood still happening now.

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    1. Tank you for that thoughtful comment, Meike. It is generally thought that of every ten on Death Rw, at least one is innocent, and often executed. (excuse typos. This thing doesn't like to correct them, and you know what I mean!)

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  3. Frances, I had to 'look up' your man, and found quite a horrific tale. What a pity that he didn't devote his time to writing before his murder; he seems to have talent.

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    1. There is no saying he's actually guilty, Cro. But my job isn't to judge him. No one is all bad, and had I had his childhood, I might have ended up the same way. Who knows?

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  4. Following Cro's lead, I also looked him up……an horrific tale indeed! However, what is served by keeping him on death row all this time, I fail to see. It is a cruel thing for a so called civilised nation to do.

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    1. Thanks, Frances. I don't think anyone should be identified solely by the worst thing they've done.

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  5. The poem does a good job of showing the tedium and pointlessness of life on death row.

    I can't see how this system of punishment helps anyone. If it was an effective deterent there would be some justification for it, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

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    1. It's been shown that its not a deterrent, Patsy. It's revenge; pure and simple.

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  6. I have no intention of looking up what this man did and I'm sure he is being hugely punished by being where he is - death would no doubt be preferable, I'd imagine. However, that is a really sensitive and well written poem and I'm pleased to have read it.

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    1. That was a really nice, thoughtful comment, Rosemary. Thank you.

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  7. The question of his innocence or guilt is not the issue here. It's the inhumane way they are kept on death row. I read the poem, and it is very moving, even if written by a guilty man.

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  8. Frances you are well aware of my views on the subject of the death penalty and death row and I rarely comment because I would simply keep on repeating myself. I'm sure that many innocent people are found guilty just as many more guilty ones go free. I would submit that the system is not at fault per se but the fact that it is humans who operate it and, in many cases and many countries, defence before the law is not available to those who can't afford it and justice weeps.

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  9. Your Death Row inmate's poem was, by the way, far from what one might expect from someone with what I understand his upbringing to have been.

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