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The Prisoners


Steel doors-guillotine gates-
of the doorless house closed massively.
We were locked in with loss.


Guards frisked us, marked our wrists,
then let us into the drab Rec Hall-
splotched green walls, high windows barred-


where the dispossessed awaited us.
Hands intimate with knife and pistol,
hands that had cruelly grasped and throttled


clasped ours in welcome. I sensed the plea
of men denied: Believe us human
like yourselves, who but for Grace. . . .


We shared reprieving Hidden Words
revealed by the Godlike imprisoned
One, whose crime was truth.


And I read poems I hoped were true.
It's like you been there, brother, been there,
the scarred young lifer said.

Written by Robert Hayden (1913-1980)

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