Written in Grey

Prison bars were my home from before I was born.
Stretching back for generations, an insane notion
That to be free is sin.
And the years and comings and goings of
Grandparents, to parents, to sons, to daughters, and to me,
Laid the foundation, brick by brick,
Forged the iron bars of suppression,
The cold steel of modesty,
An uncaring frame of reference.

And into a prison, a child is born, screaming.
Quieted at once, lovingly confined,
A captive life the only one their parents know.
A child is born, grows,
Strains against the bars of their cage,
And, sharpened sticks and batons at the ready,
Their wardens beat them back in again.

Fed scraps of love and contentment,
Given yard time upon good behavior,
Their heart atrophies,
New growth deemed unruly.

So who is to blame
When the child grows up,
Their jailers leave, or are pushed away,
And the adult (still a child inside) is to fend for themself,
And their home was a cage, so they seek solace?
The legacy, borne through this child,
Gives birth to new misery.
Seeking scraps, seeking comfort,
Finding both amply
In the lukewarm embrace
Of a new cage.

And if, by chance,
The child glimpses,
On tip-toes, a nose pressed on tempered glass,
The outside --
What is the child to do
But to wonder and writhe,
Knowing at last they are starving,
Knowing for once they're unwell?

Then who is to blame,
When the child breaks free,
Bleeding and beaten and broken,
New birth to a new era,
New child to a new mother...

Who is to blame,
When the child's heart --
A sickly, rotten thing
That has not known freedom --
Cannot fathom the horizon?
The vast, stretching vistas,
Rolling, barren hills,
The mountains, sharp as a cutlass,
And an aching feeling
Draped over the land like a shroud,
That this child cannot survive
Without captivity.