I remember thinking, ‘When does a person adjust to this madness?  When will I feel whole again?’

I still don’t know.  What I do know is that being in here is like losing a part of yourself, or losing a loved one.  When does a person fully recover from that, or say they are ‘fine’?

Life has taught me that each of us is forced to face things we don’t want to face, learn things we don’t want to learn and experience things we don’t want to experience.   It takes time to acclimate to this new life.  It takes time to redefine being ‘fine’.  There are no timelines for it to happen, no countdowns, no circles on the calendar that say – This Is The Day!

After eighteen years under this spell, I have learned that for me it takes work, patience, perseverance and a few prayers – but even then things aren’t going to be ‘fine’.  Each morning there is an effort to work up the strength to face another day and the question, ‘Do I have enough hope left to sustain me for today?’  It’s not easy creating hope in a hopeless place.  It is a constant struggle to find meaning and purpose in this life.

It is often said that the best counsel for someone who has hit bottom is to simply tell them to take the next step.  But it is when we are hurting the most, we tend to forget the things that are most essential.  Sometimes just knowing someone is there, a human connection, has proven to be the most helpful.  At least that has been the case in my journey of healing – healing from a place that continues to eat holes in my soul.

Adversity tests our faith, character and resolve.  For the incarcerated serving life who will die in prison, loss is perennial, an unavoidable enemy and daily reminder of the consequence of a bad decision.  Death and its shadow linger overhead like vultures.

Death and loss touch all those who are living.  In my dark nights, through prayer I find comfort in a great exchange.  I give God my sorrow, fear, and despair and in return receive God’s joy, courage, faith, hope, love and grace for one more day.  The Psalmist said, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil because You are with me…”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  Darrell is a gifted and thoughtful writer serving a life sentence.  He can be contacted at:
Darrell Sharpe #W80709
P.O. Box 43
Norfolk, MA 02056

Other Writing by Darrell 

My heart is crumbling into dust, not pieces.
There is no reconstructing the damage.
I’m bleeding.
I want redemption for my penance,
As the lost seek Divine forgiveness.
Hope is all I have,
And it’s a fine thread from heaven.
Despair is a razor rendering the cord unwoven.
I’m on borrowed time, with an impossible interest rate,
In fear of having the loan called in.
I grow weary from all this prison life,
So, I’m going to sleep.
Perhaps tomorrow I’ll try again.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  Darrell has contributed several pieces to this site and continues to write.  He wrote this piece not long ago, shortly after a friend of his lost his life inside his cell.

Darrell Sharpe #W80709
P.O. Box 43
Norfolk, MA 02056

Deep in the confines of our prison predicament, where our lonely existence fades out of the sight, mind, heart and emotions of others – you remember us in friendship, with humanity and kindness.  You come to know us, understand us, and care for us in ways most others could not, would not, or cared less to do.

In the degradation, abject humiliation, abandonment, and neglect we feel inside this deathly cold womb of incarceration, isolation, and loneliness, your friendship is truly a consoling companion and walkinthoseshoes is a lifeline to the living.   In spite of our sins, flaws, and guilt, you show mercy and sympathy and manifest grace and forgiveness.  In our deep regret, lamentation, and repentance for our transgressions, you offer empathy, compassion, and afford us absolution.

For our rehabilitation, you provide encouragement, hope, support, and confidence, and shower us with your knowledge, wisdom, and spiritual nourishment.  When circumstances threaten to turn us into animals and monsters, you help to shelter our humanity and inspire us to rise above the demons of our world, to subjugate the beasts within, to protect, promote and be the best that we can be – making you a truly indispensable ally in many of our battles and triumphs, including those against our base aspects.  Anonymous stranger, friend, or significant other, some of us may be to you, but to all of us, you are much more than a ‘mentor of authors’.

Kim, your mere presence in our lives is reason enough for some of us to better ourselves, when and where other reasons may not exist.   Among souls of times, past, present, and future, yours is of a divine nature and sublime substance, because by the virtue of your enlightenment, magnanimous principles, benevolent deeds, and noble ways and actions, it’s you that helps us to endure, overcome and also to transcend the penitence for our ignoble deeds, ways and actions.  For that, we shall always remain immeasurably grateful and profoundly appreciative, admiring of you for being the illuminated, uplifting and incomparably beautiful earthy angel that you are.  Thank you!

This was a gift to me, from a man serving life.  Darrell has contributed several pieces to this site, and continues to write.

Darrell Sharpe #W80709
P.O. Box 43
Norfolk, MA 02056

The windows here at the MCI Norfolk Security Housing Unit extend from floor to ceiling, about eight feet high, and only five inches wide, impossible for anyone to escape through.  The Plexiglas is clear.  That surprised me, because most segregation units I’ve landed in have cell windows that are frosted over from the outside, making them impossible to look through.  Here, there are trees and lots of wildlife.  I see the occasional hawk looking for a bite to eat or a blue pickup truck driving ever so slowly along the perimeter fence.  Here, we’ve got a view.

This morning I got in a good workout and took a birdbath in my sink. As I hung up my laundry on the clothesline beside my bunk, a golden stream of sunshine poured into my cell.  Drawn to its warmth, I sat down yoga style and crossed my legs at the base of my window, looking out at the nearby gravel and moss.  As I peered through the glass, I noticed a small insect climbing up the window’s sheer face.  An ant was on the inside of the pane, a rare visitor to my cold prison cell.  I gave it a closer look, aided by the sunlight outside that illuminated his semi-transparent body.  He was red.  Should I crush him?   I’d hate to lose track of him and later awake to find him gnawing on a piece of my leg.  Plus, he was likely a scout!  What if he found a crumb and rushed back to tell his army that there was food in my cell?

Twice I held my finger poised above his fragile body, and twice I aborted the assault.  The longer I stared at him, the more I was impressed by his tiny, intricate design.  Surely, in a thousand years, I could never create something so amazing.  So, why should I crush him?  It’s not like cutting down a tree and knowing I could plant another.  So, I let him live, and he continued his journey up the window pane.

“A Stupid Little Bug”

About halfway up the window pane, he slipped and fell, dropping a few hundred of his own body lengths and smacking his tiny self against the sill.  Yet, within a matter of seconds, he was back up and remounting the glass.  The fall didn’t even daze him, though it would certainly have bruised the life out of me. Extremely interested now, I sat watching him scale the glass again, even cheering for him, as each attempt ended in disaster.  He climbed, slipped, and his plunge ended, once again, on cold steel.  I couldn’t help but smile at how stupid the little bug was.  As I watched him try, yet again, my vision refocused onto a blue pickup truck driving by, past the electric barbed wired fence perimeter, driven by a prison guard making good money for driving in circles all day.  Maybe we’re not so much better than the ant?  At least he was trying.  At least he was moving forward.  Quitting wasn’t a part of his vocabulary, I realized, as I watched the blue pickup disappear from view.  The idea of giving up wouldn’t make sense to the ant.  He was programmed to always keep going, keep trying… How come we humans don’t share the ant’s drive to conquer the hurdles in our own lives?

Anyway, the ant made his way about two-thirds up the pane, and I decided to play human helper and not let him fall again.  I grabbed a yellow envelope and held it flush on the window, a few inches below him, like a safety net.  My arm got tired just holding the envelope. He fell twice – once about a foot from the top and again a few inches further up.  If he had chosen to explore the yellow envelope rather than remount the window, I would have simply blown him out under my cell door and sent him on his way.  But both times when he hit the paper, he was back on the glass before I could even get a good look at him.  His enthusiasm made me happy.  I was intrigued to see what would happen when he reached the top of the window.

“A Journey to Nowhere”

And, he did reach the top.  I held my face within inches of him as his antennae touched the black sealant.  He examined it briefly, then turned and scurried off toward the left side of the window.  When he reached the sealant there, he turned around and headed for the right side. This went on for about ten minutes.  Finally, I told him he was on his own, and I pulled the envelope away from the window.  Of course, once the safety net was gone, he slipped off the glass and plummeted to the bottom.  I leaned down to see what shape the fall had left him in and found him crumpled up in a grave of sealant.  He was still moving but only a little, so I left him and decided to eat my lunch.

There wasn’t much to the lunch.  SHU time gets even harder when you’re living on state food.  As I finished off my oatmeal cookie, I looked over to see if my hurt ant was healthy enough to enjoy a sliver of my second oatmeal cookie.  But wait!  He was back on the window pane!  I couldn’t believe it – four inches up from the bottom and moving along like it was the thing to do!  I examined him closely and noticed that all of his parts seemed to be working just fine.  Since I was by myself, with no books or a celly to help pass the time, I had nothing better to do than watch this little guy climb the window for about an hour.  In between, I cleaned my cell, drank some water to hydrate myself for the next workout, and sat down at my desk to write this essay.  All the while, I intermittently watched the ant.

It didn’t make sense.  He had fallen about a dozen times and reached the top twice since I ate.  But he still kept on climbing.  Shouldn’t he have, by now, figured out that there’s nothing up there for him?  ‘Why does he keep climbing?’  I wondered.  I stood looking at him, my face just inches from his.  At one point he stopped moving and twittered his antennae at me.  It was as if he were saying, ‘I just like to climb, buddy!  It’s all about the climb!’

At that moment I came to realize that we all, at one time or another, fail and fall down in life, but like this determined ant, we must never stop fighting, never stop climbing.  Regardless of the destination, the climb is what it’s all about.  And when we are unwilling to give up, a new beginning awaits us all.

Written by a man serving life.
Darrell Sharpe #W80709
P.O. Box 43
Norfolk, MA 02056

First, I must apologize for the picture I am about to share because of what it has done to me and what it will likely do to you.  I’ve carefully searched through my stack of pictures to find the one that would vividly illustrate the loss that violence brings, but there were no photos to properly convey the gravity of what I’d like to share.  So, I have no choice but to paint one, a picture painted in words.

Long before I stepped inside a prison cell, I knew firsthand what violence could take away.  Most think they do too, but I want to share another look, an intimate one.

Violence is the voice of my three little sisters saying to me with tears in their eyes, “Are you going to jail?  What did you do?”

Violence is my little nephew telling his Nana that if he eats all of his vegetables, his muscles will turn to rocks because all he remembers of his uncle is squeezing my arms inside a prison visiting room.

Violence is my baby sister, who received the brunt end of my affection, crying as she blew out the candles of her birthday cake because all she wished for was her big brother to come home.

Violence is the aftermath of me taking another person’s life and a death certificate that reads, ‘Parents too distraught to sign’.

Violence is the real emptiness that is left behind.

Violence is the guttural sound that escaped my mother’s lips when the judge gave me a ‘life sentence’.

Violence is the lie I told my mother after the trial when I said, “Momma, everything’s going to be alright.”

Violence is the sum of years that I’ve spent trying to atone for something for which there is no atonement.  It is the tears that stream down my face and stain this page as I write.

Violence is the picture I’ve painted with words, a picture of the true horror and great despair that I can never erase.  I only hope and pray that no one will ever have to paint on this canvas for themselves, because violence is not the answer.

Written by Darrell Sharpe #W80709
P.O. Box 43
Norfolk, MA 02056