This is Larry Stromberg from SCI Phoenix. This is my poem entitled “Isolation.”
Isolation
Locked away 22 and two, maybe a video visit here and there, now and then.
My TV and radio have become my means of communication and conversation.
I work out in the dog kennels.
My cell becomes a gym in itself, cuffed and shackled to the shower like an animal.
My food trays fly in through the cell wicket with aggression,
As does my controlled commissary orders.
Phone calls and kiosks for my emails travel to the door daily,
As does a sliding mail at times.
I read book after book,
travel to different worlds and cultures and places.
Fighting my criminal case in the courts under these conditions of the condemned.
In some ways I like it, other ways I don’t.
Like I said, I feel like an animal.
I become desensitized to my circumstances and surroundings.
Some guards look at me like I’m the devil himself.
Hell, I put myself here in my insanity.
These are the consequences of my mental illness.
My remorse is deep, truly deep.
I may die here.
I may make it out alive.
In some ways, I’m already dead.
Isolation has taken away my sanity.
Still, I try to remain human as much as possible,
Even in the silence.
The silence.
These commentaries are recorded by Prison Radio.
