CIRCLES.

“Certain kinds of black men’s stories,” Elizabeth Alexander once wrote, “are ever in vogue, stories that offer the easy paradigms of criminality and putative redemption.” My life and career after prison bore that out. When I came home, I confessed my crime to anyone who would listen, emphasizing my mastery of what I called the three R’s of rehabilitation: regret, remorse, responsibility. I pursued achievements that I thought would validate me in the eyes of others. I earned a bachelor’s degree, wrote an award-winning poetry collection and had a memoir about my time behind bars published. My story brought me recognition, but my writing often felt like a return to the scene of the crime. I didn’t realize how, in telling my story of redemption, I was also internalizing the state’s judgment of me as a threat.
“A Gun Derailed My Childhood. As An Adult I Found Relief at the Range.”
by Reginald Dwayne Betts
New York Times Magazine, May 17, 2026

We carry Betts’s books of poetry in and out of prison to use in our workshops. I admire the nimble movement of his phrases on the page and his unblinking honesty. Betts is the kind of poet who holds our writers’ attention. At sixteen he fell and served little over eight years of a nine-year sentence. Upon release, he propelled himself from prison cell to college, to Yale Law School, to acclaim as a poet, MacArthur Fellow, and now he engages in acts of service through his Freedom Rings project (installing beautifully constructed and appointed libraries in prisons across the country.) While, these accomplishments are impressive to our writers, they are most compelled by the seamless construction of his writing as it weaves his carceral history into life outside the walls. Here is a poet who sees with their eyes.

Throughout the “Gun Derailed” essay, I circle back to Betts’s “Three R’s of rehabilitation: regret, remorse, responsibility.” These themes cycle prominently in our workshop conversations. You see, the label “felon” leaves sticky bits of fear and shame to the story, and as Betts describes even his accomplishment can’t quite wipe away the residue. When I read this story of an exceptional man, I think of the incredible pressure placed on returning citizens. If a MacArthur Genius can’t crack the stigma ?!! … the question plagued me and so I brought it to this week’s workshop. We discussed the Betts article and then, I asked the participants to weigh the extraordinary against the ordinary and write about their relationship to it. In one conversation we discussed how the everyday view of the mountains seen from the prison yard in Madras would be awe-inspiring for a person at Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem. In response to Betts’s biography, OH! from Deer Ridge wrote this passage about his childhood:

Gosh, I was a bright child is what comes to mind. How do I know? Cause I was told and acknowledged all the time. I miss that child. I wasn’t so much a nerd but more like a scholar, loving to learn every minute of every hour. My brain was my tower or power. I was always ready for praise cause I did what was right (that’s just the way I was raised) until I met my rival, abuse and being afraid. No longer wanting to shine to not be noticed and keeping a target of my behind. My mind’s decline began when I would hide and think of crimes. Unknown to me, they were ways of protection — a way to seek attention and affection. Instead, I became infected, bright as a blacklight.

When OH! finished reading, there was a collective exhale in the room. We listened with rapt attention as we considered a child’s bright light taking a different cast when it was exposed to abuse. In these moments, we feel the profound good fortune to have meet, even if the conditions are less than ideal. Our quiet poet, OH! has let us in a little bit closer and it is extraordinary.

RINGS.

Everyone needs a reason to remember,
Even if remembering brings about tears.
Shahid will tell you he knows the ugliest among
to be a rugged child to disappear, &
Still failed to vanish, breaking great with men
Who carried life sentences like clichés
— Rings, Reginald Dwayne Betts

This collection of writing is a circulatory system of memories and feelings evoked by the poem, Rings from Reginald Dwayne Betts’s latest book Doggerel.

Dustin Smith from Oregon State Penitentiary writes Rings/Memory:
I remember my father’s rings most of all. He was a reserved man. He didn’t ascribe to any ostentation. He learned, as we all do, to build up walls too high to see over. The barbarians at the gates can be kept outside if he built his walls high enough. Yet, I always remember the rings.

You See the Ring by Yeyin Chin at Oregon State Penitentiary:
Before you die, you see the ring …
O-rings, glow rings, sucker pop rings and “bling” rings,
these are a few of my favorite things.

Jesse James Jimenez from Snake River writes Alone:
Alone.
The Most Comforting Feeling.
No Worries Of Life And Death.
Without Responsibility To Another.

Robert Tsow writes Walls and Fences from Snake River:
You see believe it or not through incarceration we learn our self-worth, just because we’re in this predicament we shouldn’t be kicked to the curb, no we shouldn’t be stripped away from equal opportunity that we deserve, these walls & fences puts us through trials & and tribulations

Michael Stephina from Snake River writes Rings:
This day comes to be yesterday,
Where do I find you?
I look forward only to see the past
It reminds me of why I can’t find you.

Grandmother’s Rings by Le’Var Howard at Oregon State Penitentiary:
My grandmother was wise and has always told me she sees too much of her daughter in me. Things I would do or how I fell in love with melodies, music. She sat up in the living room of our small apartment, waiting all night playing with her purse. She knew her words were echoing in my head, that she had touched my heart, and I didn’t know what to do with my guilt.

This is how love brings
You to tears. Some of us accumulate
Rings like dogs, each finger holding its own
Promise & history.
— Rings, Reginald Dwayne Betts

Alone.
The Most Comforting Feeling.
No Worries Of Life And Death.
Without Responsibility To Another.
Able To Move Freely Within The World.
Hunger Being A Familiar Feeling.
Violence Is A Calming Sound Like A Missed Relative.
Completely At Peace In The Chaos Like The Eye Of A Storm.
Tomorrow Is A Better Day.
Why Is The Feeling Then Fear.
Hunger Is Gone And Replaced With Terror.
The Sun Is Shining And Inside Is Anger.
Warm Bed And Feeling Disdain. | JJJ

I remember my father’s rings most of all. He was a reserved man. He didn’t ascribe to any ostentation. He learned, as we all do, to build up walls too high to see over. The barbarians at the gates can be kept outside if he built his walls high enough. Yet, I always remember the rings. Little bits of ornamentation that he felt safe enough to share. They meant something to him… and so they mean something to me. Rough, calloused hands. Gnarled and hard from a lifetime of work and fighting to survive. I can still see the wrinkles, creases, and oft-broken knuckles; sitting underneath the knuckles, beautifully crafted gold and rubies, softening the rocky granite that they rested on. Those hands were hard, but I always remember them softly. Those hands that broke faces and crafted adult things were tender too. I see these rings still, resting upon my shoulders as my dad leaned down to kiss me on the crown of my head. I see these rings reaching out to me to help me back up. I see these rings feeding a family, making sure we were alright. I see these rings in memories of what it means to be a man. To live. To love. I see these rings in my dreams. | DS

This day comes to be yesterday.
Where do I find you?
I look forward only to see the past.
It reminds me of why I can’t find you.
Maybe you are not looking LOOK AT ME!
Look at me!
I look, you look, still nothing to be
seen.
Look up and out. What’s this
Reflection in that shadow of a silhouette
Step closer.
Eye wide shut.
No open them!
See it, see it! Turn on the light of your Mind Heart Spirit.
It’s you, it’s me.
I see me.
Eye see you.
We are
The key
You find ME
Eye find you
Find...... What you truly need. Not what you want.
Love is perception
You are not alone... not today,
Eyes are with you | MS

Before you die, you see the ring …
O-rings, glow rings, sucker pop rings, and “bling” rings,
these are a few of my favorite things.
The hills are alive with the sound of my musing…
One right, two ring, three ring, four,
I trip over a ring painted on the court.
Rings around my wrist, rings about my eyes,
I wring out my laundry and leave it to dry. | YC

I had never seen my grandmother hurt before. Not emotionally, not by me. I felt so bad. I wanted to cry. My grandmother was wise and has always told me she sees too much of her daughter in me — things I would d or how I fell in love with melodies, music. She sat up in the living room of our small apartment, waiting all night playing with her purse. She knew her words were echoing in my head, that she had touched my heart, and I didn’t know what to do with my guilt. She also knew I couldn’t sleep without talking to her. I came from my bedroom, my little brother, JK was sound asleep. My eleven-year-old heart was ticking and pounding in my little chest and my socks tracked through a thick hallway carpet. “Grandma?” I said almost pathetically. I can’t remember if she answered, but I do remember apologizing over and over. “You’ll never steal from me again?” she said. “NO!!” I said, “No! I’m sorry.” She knew I meant it. She knew I would never do this again. I think she understood my mistake, my rush and eagerness, eager to impress. I had stolen my grandmother’s diamond and ruby red ring to give as an offering to a young girl, a fellow classmate at Irvington Elementary. To her surprise, she accepted the large ring, but when her mother saw she had to use two fingers to wear the right I’d given her, she had to find out where it came from. She gave me up, and that night I learned the value of being trustworthy and accepting responsibility. | LH

Behind these walls & fences I see a lot of people who made poor decisions, but even through these felony convictions they show time after time after time that they’re so relentless.

You see behind these walls & fences our potential is hidden, stripped away from American citizens.

You see (believe it or not) through incarceration we learn our self-worth, just because we’re in this predicament we shouldn’t be kicked to the curb, no we shouldn’t be stripped away from equal opportunity that we deserve. These walls & fences puts us through trials & and tribulations that mend us into the person we are ... Today, you see we all commit ... mistakes, but should those mistakes define me? No, I shouldn’t let it. Should these felony convictions define us? No, we shouldn’t let it.

You see my words are my bullets, my voice is the weapon, these walls & fences are used as suppression, so if I put these words to voice them out loud, praying that there is someone in the crowd that sees what I see ... the potential around.

Walls & fences. | RT

After leading our workshop at Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution, we drive sixty out of Pendleton over Deadmans Pass — the treacherous double-hair pin curved highway that gains over 2000-ft in elevation. Semi-trailers flash their hazards as they crawl alongside us. I find myself involuntarily narrowing my shoulders as if we are squeezing through a tight door jam. At this entrance into the Blue Mountains, a roadside pullout offers an extraordinary view of the lushly farmed valley and the rolling hills below. By making the trek monthly, we witness the drama produced by changing light. After a busy morning of preparing for our trip, the long drive to Pendleton, and the intense work of the writing workshop this final leg of the trip comes as a welcome relief. Some evenings as we ascend the pass, it seems like we are climbing straight into the stars. Late spring brings robust sunsets that defy a camera. Throughout our travel day our eyes search far out into the horizon. Nightfall arrives, narrowing the view and with it delivers a time for quiet reflection.

A painting and writing by WC Puppy Ponderosa:
Ponderosa pines rise high into the twilight sky.
Above, I behold, the story they told as night’s first stars emerge,
a tale of old, predating time.

From Jai’s Moon Cold Shoulder:
There are different forms of freezing,
The side of a hill, a mountain really
At mid-day surrounded by pine and ponderosa
February in the Rockies at base camp with friends.

From Aaron Grover’s Lower the Lights:
Lower the lights
Your radiance slay us
Is it not enough?
You push us to the fringe
That you illuminate our sins

From Philip Thornton’s Shadows:
These shadows taunt me
Just like the lights slipping by on that
Street on the other side of the gate
My life was such a mistake
Too many times I watched it all turn to ashes

Lua by Ian Lohrman:
full moon mother of emotional flux and reflux
your soft beam kneads my supple ocean
Your waxing and waning, the cadence of your lunation
pouring me through timeless hydrologic cycles of memory

And, Nightfall by Michael Stepina:
Between the motion of light and stillness of Dark
We find our resolution inside the spectrums of this prison.
Only in the middle of this perception,
Where light and dark are one
can there exist such a balance that has the power
to turn saints into sinners and sinners into saints.

As night falls, we find balance between light and dark, the certain and uncertain. We begin to wind our brains and our bodies down. It seems so natural to draw close as the light lowers. We circle up to conserve heat, our eyes search dark shadows, guarding our space to make certain that it is safe. We scour imagined darkness and finally close our eyes to dream. | TDS

I

It is not permission we seek.
In the effects of infinity within the constantly moving thin blade
Between the motion of light and stillness of Dark
We find our resolution inside the spectrums of this prison.
Only in the middle of this perception,
Where light and dark are one
Can there exist such a balance that has the power
to turn saints into sinners and sinners into saints.
One that turns chaos into order.
Rendering confusion and conflict into comprehension and
co-operation.
Creating a lasting love in the awakening consciousness
of the eternal recognition of each other in oneself
Giving birth to a mutual respect and peace.
No… It is not permission we seek.

II

The perfection of the life is a rendering of a painting filled with
many colors, shapes, and textures
intentionally unfinished by its creator.
Left purposefully to comprehend the possibilities and potential
of completion, to the creation itself.
Art is after all a rendition of the Artist and life is a continued
Journey of many experiences and discoveries of eternal growth
of the unknown and yet, to be seen within oneself.

III

We travel in time to places we forget and to places yet discovered
The day of today is far in the past.
The day of today is far in the future.
We travel in time as I sit here in place.
On a timeline of infinity, our bodies finite and fragile
The grudge, egotistically holds any it can hostage
with the pretense it’s keeping its victims safe.
Protecting the chosen from perceived “Them and They” threats.
Life is not personal, it happens to everyone.
And yet, the shadow of the Ego clenches its teeth and fist at
every perceived slight.
Life happens, mistakes are made in the footstep of stumbles
“Not all things deserve punishment, sometimes all that’s needed is
forgiveness.”
It’s hard to forgive.
It means one has to realize its own part and find understanding
It means one has to let go of whatever it’s holding on to.
It means one has to stop punishing, not only the other but oneself as well.
The Ego will always claim the right to be right, even when wrong.
Because of the Ego, “Everything is taken personally, but it is only in the
impersonal that we find solutions.”
On a timeline of infinity, we are but a blemish.
Yesterday was not guaranteed nor the time that is left.
Reconcile with the heart and everything beyond that …
Well, that’s up to you. | MS

Life lives by killing and eating itself, casting off death and being reborn like the moon.
Joseph Campbell

full moon mother of emotional flux and reflux
your soft beam kneads my supple ocean
your waxing and waning, the cadence of your lunation
pouring me through timeless hydrologic cycles of memory

steadfast, oldest friend of Earth
casting sideling glances in lakes and streams
your ludicrous scenes of tidal logic
remain emblazoned upon my mind

to you I surrender my illuminated soul
orbiting nights in vespertine slumber
into the lucid visionary dawnflash
of reflective solar radiance

I withdraw from this physical plane
and approach you with my entire being
to merge my multi-visaged rolodex
with the phantasmagoria of watery subconscious

your arc follows my sleep
your sleep follows my waking
your parables of increase and diminishment
invite me to explore the duality of my nature

within your pale albedo dreamworld’s
sleepy-eyed mirror of absurdity
I scry verities in dire need of discovery
retrieving the buried fragments of my refracted self. | IL

Lower the lights
Can’t you see
We are the dark
We are hopes lost

Lower the lights
Your radiance slay us
Is it not enough?
You push us to the fringe
That you illuminate our sins

Lower the lights
Given unto us this heavy burden
Life’s unwanted, broken
And discarded.

Lower the lights
For every mirror a daylight glimmer
Tears rain down in endless waves
Can’t you see
We are the dark
We are the reflection, Distorted. | AG

There are different forms of freezing,
The side of a hill, a mountain really
At mid-day surrounded by pine and ponderosa
February, in the Rockies at base camp with friends.

There are different forms of freezing,
In the cooler at the back of the restraint
Doing coke lines and whippets before a shift
Hooters premier managers training in June.

There are different forms of freezing,
slogging through the deluge gutters flooded
Rain coming down in sheets so wet you don’t care anymore
The car miles away on the tow hook in April of ’92.

There are different forms of freezing,
vacuous iridescent panoramas with no air turbulence
Seemingly infinite space between the two planets.
Their gravity entwined in November, but not quite working.

That’s what kind she was to me,
her moon cold shoulder turned away from my caress,
having murdered her consideration with my heavy rolling stone.
She became colder to me that last year than the former three. | JM

The shadow of these bars on the windows
make me think
So much of my life was a mistake.
So many times thriving on the pain.
So many times it was all insane.
These shadows taunt me.
Just like the lights slipping by on that
Street on the other side of the gate.
My life was such a mistake.
Too many times I watched it all turn to ashes.
Too many times my brain went insane.
So many shadows burned into faded
Memories
Now the shadow of bars on these
Window panes
Bring me a colder kind of pain. | PT

Ponderosa pines rise high into the twilight sky.
Above, I behold, the story they told as night’s first stars emerge,
a tale of old, predating time.
In this sight I delight in creator’s might
and overflow with rejoice.
From brow to feet, heart quickening fleet, I release
bonds of preconception.
At last, I stand fast, look forward not past, and ask,
“What purpose Impending?
Purpose is life, without is to die, or live deprived
and forlorn at best.” | WP

A week or two before Christmas, Aunt Mary emails me for my grandmother’s chocolate roll recipe. I love to look at Oma’s blue cursive; the efficiency in which ingredients and directions fit neatly on the 3x5 card. I am transported to her kitchen with its cool 1970s design. Completely instep with Julia Child’s gourmet revolution, Oma was lauded in St. Louis for her elegant dinner parties. I would watch her move about that kitchen, sifting cocoa and whipping egg whites. She sipped water from a little handled measuring cup made of tin that she kept on the kitchen sink’s windowsill. I question if she ever really needed those instructions — she moved with such confidence. The handwriting, the memory of that chocolate covered confection, all of it draws the past front of mind.

Stressla Lynn Johnson “Feasting on Memories” captures his childhood through the expectation of a Sunday sermon followed by the pure heaven of his grandmother’s banana pudding. “You see as a kid, Sundays were the day I knew that after sitting on those hard-unpadded church pews, listening to the Reverend preaching about heaven and hell, that I’d be off to Grandma’s house for our Sunday meal.” When we speak of his Grandmother’s house, I catch the glint of that little boy in Stressla’s eye as he describes her cooking. Fifty years later, he can still taste the two-layer chocolate cake that Grandma Jo Berta Jones would bake and display on the pedestal cake stand. Sitting together in our prison classroom, we share the alchemy of our grandmothers’ artistry.

In Phillip Luna’s “Because Waffles are More Interesting Than Pancakes” we now shift the view to that of a parent, far from his weekend ritual of making waffles with his son. Monday’s prison pancakes are a weekly reminder of the distance from those happier days. “Before I came to prison, I often made waffles with my son. He was little then, and making waffles was our weekend ritual. We would top the waffles with strawberries and whipped creme, or I’d let him fill the batter with chocolate chips. I remember my son’s delightfully shy, but sneaky personality. Waffles with chocolate chips felt like dessert for breakfast. We were breaking the rules and this was our mischief.” On Mother’s Day, Danny’s family will be cooking waffles with his mother. They will fire up waffle irons and fill their plates with the steaming waffles covered in butter and syrup or a smear of peanut butter.

Of my mother’s many achievements (hi Mom), mastering Oma’s chocolate roll was a hard-won victory — there is a lot of finesse getting a chocolate sponge cake to release neatly from a jelly roll pan and onto a tea towel. There is the rolling of the warm cake before it can be cooled, unrolled and filled with cream, and then rerolled — plated, and glazed in chocolate. It’s a simple concept but pulling off an elegant chocolate roll requires patience and just the right timing. Each Christmas when Aunt Mary asks, I look at the yellowed card and think that this will be the year that I whisk egg whites and fold them into the batter, sift cocoa on a tea towel, and release the perfectly cooked sponge. And year after year, the memories flood in. New ones are created. The season pasts and I refile the card. | TDS

Hey, let’s replay Mother, the radio show we made with our writers at Oregon State Penitentiary.

My prison serves pancakes on Mondays. I wish, sometimes, they would make waffles instead. Waffles are more interesting than pancakes.

Before I came to prison, I often made waffles with my son. He was little then, and making waffles was our weekend ritual. We would top the waffles with strawberries and whipped creme, or I’d let him fill the batter with chocolate chips. I remember my son’s delightfully shy, but sneaky personality. Waffles with chocolate chips felt like dessert for breakfast. We were breaking the rules and this was our mischief.

In prison, I have seen people add toppings to their pancakes. My neighbor adds slices of banana, peanut butter and chocolate syrup that he purchases from the commissary, the prison general store.

Prison food feels intentionally bad, and he says that by making the food good he is rebelling against the prison industrial complex. I think he is just hungry.

For me, the weekend-waffle-making ritual is a cherished memory. I remember once how I set his plate of waffles in front of my son and he showed me his tooth-missing smile. His smiles were the greatest compliments.

My neighbor makes his pancakes with a grin, not a smile.

I have been incarcerated for eleven years. Making waffles feels so long ago, but also like yesterday.

I worry that the routine of prison will be cement poured onto my soul, that I’ll become institutionalized and forget how to make decisions. I worry that I will become so regimented that if I don’t have pancakes on Mondays I’ll have a panic attack, and waffles will become an unthinkable breakfast option. For now, at least, I only miss waffles.

But to say I miss waffles feels particularly uncreative. As if the verb is not important enough to accurately describe my feelings. I may never eat another pancake without thinking of prison. Yet, I could eat waffles everyday for the rest of my life and somehow I would still miss them, because I cannot relive the moments with my son that have passed. | PL

It was only 7:15 in the morning, I was not even out of bed yet. I laid on top of my blankets staring at these spider-like cracks in the ceiling — cracks that looked like they were also waiting to be somewhere else. How was it possible for me to be this excited about a Sunday morning? Well, it was not just any Sunday morning for me. You see as a kid, Sundays were the day I knew that after sitting on those hard-unpadded church pews, listening to the Reverend preaching about heaven and hell, that I’d be off to Grandma’s house for our Sunday meal.

I remember the assortment of the food spread-out over the multicolored diamond imprinted tablecloth. An assortment that was-in-and-of-itself a work of art: seasoned collard greens, neck bones, pork-chops smothered in a mushroom gravy, dirty-rice peppered with sauteed chicken gizzards, fried chicken that could put Colonel Sanders out of business; ooh and that cornbread-looking up from the pan like ingots of 24-carat gold. The captivating mixture of aromas blanketing the rooms of the house in a festival of mouth-watering delicious delights.

All of this was only a prelude to what I had been thinking about since 7:15AM, as I laid staring at the cracks in my bedrooms’ ceiling. A bowl of Grandma’s vanilla wafer-banana cream pudding: creamy-smooth layers of joy that made me think: the bowl was too small; slices of bananas-wheels rolling around in creamy-vanilla-pudding almost daring me to swallow. Spoon-after-spoon of this earthy manna expertly made with Gramma’s hands of love.

Enjoying each spoon full, I recall how I would slow down as the pudding disappeared from the bowl. Even with all of the other food made with the same loving hands and heart, this banana pudding was the crowning jewel of Sunday’s meal at Grandmas’ house.

It would only be seven days until I’d be laying in my bed staring at the crack in the ceiling, preparing to tune out the threats of heaven and hell, and be once again, spoon in hand, enjoying Grandma’s banana pudding. | SLJ

A small tribute, written for my late friend

Jacob Harper died April 2, 2026. You may not have known the man, a great many things can be spoken of him for he was great. Not common by any sort, not by word, action or verse. The most wonderful thing about him was the way he lived. He loved to dabble, tinker, and craft. Much like a bard, he honored knowledge and wisdom putting his hand to many things. From sculpting to drawing, to his insatiable hunger for reading books. He would get excited to learn bits about anything. Dare you let him tinker, he could craft wood-carved amulet, a shelf, or repair my seventh pair of glasses (within the span of one year.) Like a dog with a bone, he enjoyed the hunt more than the challenge of new things. He certainly had a nose for procurement. Should I need yarn, glue, a certain type of pen … an ornament … he was known to find them. All he asked for was a little bit of time. Shame to think he has no more.

His handle was Boar, but you could never call him boring. Except for one time when we were playing Pathfinder and while he was running a game a player voiced they just wanted a hack and slash (after having four pages of storyline and ten sessions of play at the ready, he responded in kind.) We sat through four hours straight of dialogue using every trick in the DM book to avoid combat like the plague. Though he wasn’t bored. Such as it is. That was just downright mean! I liked to always say, he was organized chaos … he was mess in the sense that his drawer was mess, and he had been known to have his own sort of fun, but he stayed out of trouble.

People can say all sorts of things, but this much is true, he was the greatest of friends. He came to see me so many times in the hole, because he felt like a simple letter would not suffice. And the finesse to come see me once a week … I told you he was crafty. You could even be so bold as to call it art. Masterful, really.

You can’t know a man until you know the workings of his heart. On my honor, he never once stole, told a lie, or broke his world to me. He was kind, caring, and had a bigger heart than he needed. So just a little light on someone who truly brought me joy, as he did for many of you. | RPC

for Jacob Harper

Just glancing up, and what do I see?
I catch a glimpse of the souls of your feet.
An image burned indefinitely
One part of you from under the sheet.

Sleeping in peace far off from this place
In Abraham’s bosom till we all awake
Fly now free spirit, be gone from this place
Alive in a dream of heavenly grace.

A whole new adventure begins, does not end
Rejoined at last with your long-lost friend
A face to face chance for you to amend
The tragic mistake you could not reascend.

Heralding Angel doth freedom’s bell ring.
While my soul weeps I hope that yours sings
Ascending on high, look down at the scene
The dust where we rest until getting our wings.

The manna of Heaven is yours now to take
I hope it removes the world from your taste
Waste not a moment of thought on this place
Just focus on peace for all of our sake.

The smile on your face, dimply cheeks
The jolly expression you wore week to week
Who would have thought the last thing I’d see
One last passing glance, the souls of your feet. | WP

A lot of us are many miles from our kids, hours, states and even countries away from our loved ones. Some are fortunate enough to live in the same city, but the feeling of separation and distance still lingers in the heart of all of us who sleep behind these walls and in the hearts of our loved ones.

Some of us are able to call, have video visits, send letters, and some are not. They say that there are people that see the glass half full and others that see it half empty. It might be hard to focus on and see it half full when we can’t even contact our kids/loved ones but there are a few things we can do. That is the intention of this lesson/song/writing.

A friend of mine had a great idea. He could not get a hold of his kids when his ex-wife married someone else, so what he is doing is writing letters in a journal. Every time he thinks about his kids or dreams about them, he’ll write it in the journal. He shares when something exiting happens in his life and when he struggles and when he misses them. His hope is that one day, his kids will read his letters. If/when he reconnects with them, the journal will mean a lot more to them than the words “I always thought about you.” And it’s something that can be read again anytime, even years after he’s gone.

Some of us can make phone calls and have video visits but sometimes struggle to connect a little deeper over the phone. A friend of mine taught me the meaning of the word homeostasis. It pretty much means that people gravitate toward others that think or talk similarly and to other like-minded people. So the goal here is connect more is to find out what our kids like and dive into the topic, ask questions. Most people just want to be understood but we don’t put the effort to understand others. Ask open ended questions like “tell me about your day” instead of “how was your day?” I felt like I was pulling teeth trying to get my daughter to talk more. So, we played a game over the phone. Every time I asked her a question I was “throwing the ball” at her and she had to throw it back with her own question. After we “played,” I explained to her that when you want to carry on a conversation with someone, that’s how we “keep the ball rolling.” That was over two years ago and to this day if she asks something and I don’t open the conversation more she will tell me, “Dad, you got the ball.”

She loves singing but not in front of everyone. I asked her to go to a good hiding spot (she went to her closet) and we sang our favorite song together, Love by Keyshia Cole. Now we sing it regardless of who’s around. People will look at me all weird because I’m singing a love song on the phone and I could care less.

On Christmas, I schedule a video visit and have my mom set me up (on screen) against the wall. I’m just there and once in awhile they’ll come over and show me something they got, and we’ll share the excitement. On Thanksgiving I do a mailout and send chips and cheeze squeeze and we have nachos. On birthdays, I send a rack of cookies, and we have cookies and milk. Another thing we do is listen to music together on the phone. She will show me one new song, and I’ll show her a throwback from back in my day. Some days the conversation is nothing more than “I just wanted to tell you I love you and have a good night.” From time to time I’ll send a photo home or a random card for no reason, and she says she enjoys them. She has kept every single thing I’ve sent home over the years.

I ask from time to time, “what can I do to be a better dad?” or “what can I do to remind you that I love you?” or “what would you rather have, a 5 minute phone call or a letter and a picture?” or “would you rather have one video visit a month and less phone call time or no video visit but extra phone time?” My kids love video visits, so less phone was better for them, and we have one video visit each month. My son is a gamer so I ask him if he can show me any new games he’s playing. He usually gets super excited explaining how to level up and the upgrades he’s gotten, and it ends up being 28-minutes of watching him play video games and explaining something I don’t understand but I match his energy, and we bond over that. My daughter is into soccer and singing like me. We have a broader variety of topic, but lately she’s been showing me the latest Tic Tok dances and gets a good laugh watching her old man trying to do them.

There are many thing we can try to connect to our kids/loved ones. We have to think harder and put forth more effort — buy less at canteen and call more often. Even if most of the conversations aren’t super deep, there might/will be a day when they are having a rough day and you won’t miss that opportunity to be there for them. No matter how hard we try there are days where we feel useless as a parent and feel that we’ve let them down by being here. Seeing my daughter and son grow from two months old and one year old to 12 and 13 years old while in prison — I can say from experience that the ups and downs are inevitable. Just know the downs will pass and try to cherish the ups. Even if we are far from our kids, the little things you do will keep you close at heart. | LR