You Can't Jail Minds 
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Colours of My Life, Eleanor Reeve, Abbey Senior School, Reading
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The Song of the Shirt, Hannah Ehrlich, Parkside Community College, Cambridge
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Think About How You Would Feel, Amanda Evans, Bishop Llandaff Church in Wales School, Cardiff
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But You Can Jail Bodies by Rachel Rowan-Olive, St Albans High School For Girls
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Dayz by Josh Lewis, The Friary School, Lichfield
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I Wonder by Rosie Thurlow, Aylsham High School
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My Fears by Jack Brownbridge-Kelly, Humphry Davy School, Penzance
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Comments (7)
Here is Aditi's poem in full:
Maze
Sitting in my cell, for a crime is not a crime
Blamed to be a person, not a person,
Who I am
I am stuck in a maze, not a maze
For it has no escape route
Still trying to find open doors and
Escape routes
From this place
Which is my new world
A world which unlike the rest of the world,
As I have realised
There is no hope
As open doors and escape routes do not exixt here.
By Aditi Gaddam
Here's the full text of Eleanor's poem:
Colours Of My Life
Yellow was the colour before I came here
Red is the colour whenever they come near
Green is the colour when I see their warm clothes
Blue is the colour of my frostbitten toes
White is the colour that makes me want to fight
Black is the colour of my daylight.
Eleanor Reeve
Hannah's full poem:
The Song Of The Shirt
Over glacial sands and across the bay
There is a city called Mandalay
And there my conscience lies unbetrothed
To concerns of those I hassled and loathed
From there I was tremendously floored
By black, unselective hands of the law
Passed like hot soup from ladle to ladle
And finally marooned in a skeletal cradle
"Permit the brash arms of labour to skin you
Evince the captive that lies within you!
And toil for masters both sonic and still"
So then, without thinking, I followed their will
Year in and year out, this sole task remained
Withheld luxuries not once attained
They packed and shipped the only art
That I was graced with resources to start
A thousand shirts and dresses and shawls
Each one infected with well-adhered rules
Yet these left not a fissure in the cob
When a roomful of others could share the same job
I longed for dreamsoup cooking in my pillow
Superfluous skies and oak and willow
Instead I was offered:
Circleted wrists, palms freckled with pinpricks
My life in a pool around my ankles
My collar marred with crystallized sweat
A stunted talent, a mountianous future
From there
I descended the steps in a white cloud of dirt...
AND ALL THAT I GOT WAS THIS STUPID T-SHIRT.
This is the text of Amanda's poem:
Think About How You Would Feel
Think about how you would feel,
If someone locked you away,
A tiny cell with no one there,
Hoping for freedom some day.
A small slit as a window,
A tiny plate of food,
A crushed soul, immense starvation,
My health is not good.
I am just a prisoner,
Who is campaigning for human rights,
I would not wish for this torture for anyone,
Through the cold and lonely nights.
Through my window I can see,
Children happy, smiling and free,
How I hope they never know,
How it is to feel like me.
I am in this prison,
For no offence or sin,
But for wishing equal rights for all,
A battle I did not win.
Think about how you would feel,
If someone locked you away,
A tiny cell with no one there,
Hoping for freedom someday.
Amanda Evans
The text version of Josh's poem:
Dayz
The putrid smell wading
through the cell and
staying there permanently
like the warden’s ink
touching a piece of
paper.
The dripping of the
rain out side -
I am so thirsty
the temptation is the worst
feeling in the world,
just a touch a single
drop just enough so
I can feel it soaking
into my dried up
dehydrated skin.
It is so dark
it is as dark
as a blind man’s
vision.
If only I could
not hear the
shrieking fear
of the other
prisoners
and the dripping
temptation.
In the morning
the sun shining
in through the
insignificant
window and thoughts
rushing through my
head like children
running and laughing
in a park.
Josh Lewis
Text version of Jack's poem:
My fears
Years and years and years
The words echo through my ears
This loneliness supports my fears
And yet my eye shed no tears
Repeating each word, of course has occurred
With every different heartbeat
With every different footprint
With every different breath
But my fears always say the same
Each day gambling my hope
Each day trying to cope
Life is like one big rope
Climbing that horrible slope
Of despair. And knowing I will never get there
With every different heart beat
With every different footprint
With every different breath
But my fears always say the same
My hands were in pain
My legs hit from canes
Humiliation like a lion’s shaven main
But then along comes the freedom train
I get on board, and pull the prison cord
With every new heartbeat
With every new footprint
With every new breath
And my fears will never bother me again
By Jack Brownridge Kelly
great collection
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