Prison Walls
(Group Poem) by Diamond Stribling, Daquita Spriggs, Shaniece McWilliams, Antonette Cunningham and Adriana Wellington
 
Graved cuts on the cell wall
Your final home is death between those bars.
Injuring your brain thinking about what you did in the past
Thinking about what drove you here.
What make you mad.
 
Prison walls are gray and black.
Uniforms are orange.
Walking to my cell thinking, “What if I started, when I was born?”
 
This is one truth. One truth that may cost my whole life.
I’m here today to speak up for what I did.
The past to my whole life one truth.
A whole lot of love is what I though I had
Seeing starts but they don’t’ shine.
In these prison walls a dollar and a dream is all
I need.
 
I need a dollar and a dream to succeed in the Chi-town
prison walls.  
 
© 2005

Fears
by Starshana Wilkins
 
Who fears when there is a bully around the corner?
Who fears when someone is in trouble?
Who fears when there is girl crying for help?
Who fears when someone is fighting?
Who fears when there is no teacher in the room?
Who fears when there is no school?
Who fears when there are no friends around?
Who fears when there are gangbangers on the street?
Who fears when people are selling drugs outside on the corner?
Who fears and worries about people and me because these
things are bad inside you and on the outside.
That's why I fear and worry about bad things.
© 2005

Group poem by Patricia Morales, Francheska Olmo, Yari Santiago, Vanessa Vazquez, and Tiffany Malone (8th Graders at Von Humboldt)
 
There's no love in the community.
What's going on?
Chitown has no unity.
My older cousin, staring at the prison walls.
Then his high self-esteem talks.
He left his mom injured inside.
With stress a silent killer she tries to hide.
We see the city as an inspiration
to a world of violence with no destination.
If you live in the city with not one nerve,
then life's too bad, you just go served.

© 2005