3 short offerings

TIME
By Manuel Williams

Time is to heal all things:
Pain, sorrow, frustration,
When we only look at the hurt,
But never look at the time it took to become healed,
Through all our days of grief,
never to realize what dominated our time
to look What’s the outer control that pained us,
Which distance focus from time,
What heart destined to be broken once more with the advent of Spring,
Should heal next Summer?
Time can’t run from us, nor can we run from time,
No matter what the problem may be, time would catch up
And we deal with the things we see
What we can’t deal with now, we have to deal with later
Later is the pass tense of things we look over to ignore.

drawing and poem by:
Manuel Williams #303943; CCI; PO Box 900; Portage, WI 53901
Manuel is a young man who has been in segregation for many years - he will not tolerate being humiliated and therefore does not do well in the prison environment. Recently he has changed prisons and although he is still in segregation, we hope he will start anew. Feel free to write him and use our email if you have any questions or need support in this. Here he is trying his hand at poetry and drawing


l've always been alone.
by Johnny Lacy
My reminiscence pays no tribute to any happier times,
I ask my mind to be quiet so I can hear the whispers of my heart.
My body tells my soul how it's searched the universe for one tidbit of true ecstasy.....
My spirit is on a perpetual errand in search for its kindred....
Half a century has gone by..yet I'm not half a centarian.

I watch the moon and stars through the ceiling while lying face down in my bed.
I am chilled by the breeze that blow through a concrete wall over the rugged edges of cold steele.
Some times when there's pandemonium in my mind,
It results in catastrophe in my feelings.
But then, who cries for my soul?
A souls that seeks, but never finds redemption.

Everyone has a mistake in their past.
So I'm forced to reconcile it with all the facts..
I've always been alone.
My only consolation has been the fact that my life has been spotted with small joys and full of long sorrows.
So I wonder- is it my lack of dangerous aggression,
or my extraordinary simplicity that subjects me to these vulnerabilities??...

I've never known.. through my spirit, which is my astral self,
I've looked into a bartering of extraordinary revelations
And found an exposition of lost souls wandering about
With no particular destination,
Should I remain in a complete dislocated lucidity, or join the rat race?

So I'm suspended in misery, no eyes grow moist for me-
No shadows can hide my grief?
No comforts can provide me with relief-that I've found.
Now that you've peeked into the small, tragic history of my life, tell me,
Is it beyond scary to you also or would you term me as an ancient survivor.
Keep uppermost in mind-This life has manifest itself- because I 've always been alone.

Johnny Lacy #71373;WCI: PO Box 351; Waupun , WI 53963
Johnny needs friends, is easy to write to and very open and enthusiastic. Again use our email for questions. He has many poems we will be featuring.

Jerry Price #171022
ST. Louis Corr Facility; 8585 N Croswell Rd; St louis, MI 48880
Jerry is in Michigan in a private prison. He has severe health problems. At one point we tried to advocate for him to get a foot injury worked on and could not get more than a toe in the door because of the private nature of the system -there simply was no one we could talk to who had direct responsibilty. Jerry has a philosphical bent and is always sweet and respectful .

quotes from Jerry
Carl Jung is quoted as saying “One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”
Epictetus says “the man who is not satisfied with little will be satisfied with nothing.”
Robert M Pirsig says “The place to improve the world is first in one own’s heart, head and hands.”
Clement Stone: “ In every adversity there are seeds of an equal or greater opportunity.”
Confucius: The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.”
Art Buchwald” The best things in life aren’t things.”
William Arthur Ward: “It is often beyond our power to avoid criticism, but it is always in our power to avoid being critical.”
Jerry’s New Year advice: “The door of success swings in the hinges of obstacles. So in the New Year, Dance like there’s no one looking, Love like you’ve never been hurt, And work like you don’t need the money."

Two by Jalaladdin Rumi, the great Sufi mysticsubmitted by Jerry

1)Love Yourself EnoughYou were born with potential.Tou were born with goodness and truth.You were born with ideas and dreams.You were born with greatness.You were born with wings.You are not meant for crawling, so don’t,You have wings.Learn to use them and fly

2) Out beyond ideas of wrong and right is a field.I‘ll meet you there.

Jerry price #171022; ST. Louis Corr Facility; 8585 N Croswell Rd; St louis, MI 48880




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