It’s night in the city of Philadelphia.
The flakes are falling almost as fast
as the temperatures drop. The cold, malignant
and unremorseful as always, seeps into the
ceramic clay pot that they call my cell.

 

6 x 8 feet is the cage that contains
the bottomless volumes of my regret.
Guards drag me out of my cage, grabbing
my limp arms, suspending them above my hips.
I pray to go back.

 

At first, my eyes spin, spots in my sight.
My corneas catch fire in an instant
before the steaming orb of bright.
The biting snow flurries snap at my ears,
trying to take a piece of what little I have left.

 

The moist frigid air assaults my face.
I cry out in pain, tears leaking from my eyes and
freezing like fired clay, forever stuck in place.

 

The icy grip of hypothermia’s
unholy gauntlet clamps around my throat.

 

The crippling steel tightening:
I feel myself start to let go.

 

The cold saps life from all,
Vibrant and free becomes frozen
And stagnant, just like imprisonment.
Greater forces always collect what they’re due.
The guards haul me back inside my pot.