Present Day, Death Row.

I recently studied a photo of Stephen Hayes’ exhibit, 5 lbs., featuring a wall of dark dinner-plate-sized frames, each filled with brass shell casings.  Emerging from the bullets,  hands that seem to be reaching from underneath – or maybe surging up through – a flurry-flood, breaking the surface like drowning men and children.

The first message is cerebral.  As a series, the lots of dinner plates and lots of hands suggest a widespread pattern of violence.

The second message is emotional.  Wide-spread fingers and clenched fists speak a language I recognize – DESPERATION – showing that ultimately each of us suffer fear and death alone.

I’ve been incarcerated twenty years, but even now, at forty-one, my breath quickens as if those fingers are mine, screaming at me from the past.  When I was twelve and living in the projects, I suddenly realized that before I turned thirty, I’d either be dead, serving a life sentence, or waiting to be executed.  When I told my homies, they looked at me coolly, like I’d pointed out some obvious and natural law, the way gravity pulls all bodies toward earth’s center.  

February 1993.  The Projects.

You need to call the cops…  What?  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.  Call the cops!  That was taboo in the projects; we all knew the consequences.  My homie’s mom draped her heavy arm around my shoulders, lifted my chin to examine tonight’s damage.  I had thick red welts from where my dad’s fingers had encircled my neck.

“George, sweetie, I know we not s’posed to, but if you don’t call the cops, yo daddy gon’ kill you or one of yo brothers.”

She said it so tenderly, I started sobbing again.  Though I was scared of my dad, I was terrified of the po-leece. 

As boogeymen, police had supernatural powers to make people disappear.  Adults threatened children with them, like, if you don’t take yo li’l ass to bed, the po-leece gone take yo li’l ass to jail.  Our campfire stories centered around THE LAW – run-ins with them, running from them, getting captured by them.  I didn’t want to call the cops; I didn’t want to die either.  

She dialed, then pressed the cordless phone to my ear.  A stranger’s voice said, “9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”  

Finally, desperate, I told on my dad.  I told about the years of beatings, the broken bones, how he’d tried to kill me, that my brothers were still in the apartment with him.

By the time the cops came to rescue me, I felt better.  I figured my brothers and I would either go live with our mom (wherever she was) or go into foster care.  Either way, we’d escape the projects and our dad.

The cops were kind.  Both were middle-aged, one White, one Black.  They took me to confront my dad who stood shirtless on our stoop, smoking a cigarette.  He smirked when he saw me walking up between two brawny officers.  

We stopped about five feet away.  One of the officers rubbed warm circles between my shoulders.  They told my dad all I’d said, then got quiet.  My dad dropped his cigarette, stubbed it out with his bare heel, then growled, “Yeah, I did it.  All of it.”

The guy on my right looked down at me a couple seconds, then back at my dad.  Then he pressed me forward and said, “Well… you must’ve done something to deserve it.”

The cops nodded to my dad, then walked away saying, “Have a good night, sir.”  My dad sidestepped as I hung my head and went inside to rejoin my brothers.

Sometimes, after that night and just prior to or following a beating, my dad would drag me by an ear to the kitchen phone and thrust the receiver against my head.  “Here, call for help,” he’d say, chuckling.  I’d close my eyes and click the phone back into its cradle.

March 25, 1993.  The Projects.

I’d turn twelve at midnight.  I lay on my bed monitoring the sounds inside and outside the apartment, anxious. The corner where our sidewalk bordered our parking lot was a prime hangout spot for dealers, users, prostitutes.  Every night I listened to car stereos thumping, people laughing, bottles bursting (sometimes through our windows), the undulating tones of an argument that ended with the slaps and thuds of fists on faces – or gunshots.  After years of living here, like an inner city lullaby, these hypnotic sounds soothed me, rocked me to sleep each night.

But tonight was initiation night.  Despite having lived here so long, my family still wasn’t accepted.  At first, it was because we were only one of two nonblack families – my mom, Korean, my dad, White.  Also, my dad tried to keep my three brothers and me within shouting distance at all times, locking our doors for the day once the sun went down.  We were day-shift people.

During the day, the projects seemed mostly abandoned, withdrawn, guarded, like my dad.  Though we lived in the ‘hood, we weren’t of it.  My brothers and I were baited into fights every day.  People stole our towels, socks, even underwear off our clothesline; threw mud, burnt grease, piss and shit on our drying bedsheets.  All of it screamed, YOU DON’T FUCKING BELONG HERE!

So, I’d decided to join them.  My friends would help initiate me into the real ‘hood life.  What had me on edge was my dad.  I didn’t know the term schizophrenia yet; all I knew was that he was crazy, unstable, violent.  

He also oscillated between narcolepsy and insomnia.  Most nights, he’d prop up on the couch in our living room, in pitch dark, chain smoking Winstons… until he passed out for ten or fifteen minutes at a time.  I was waiting to hear his heavy breathing turn into snores.  I needed those loud snores if I was going to sneak out – and later, sneak back in – under their cover.

I was startled upright by screeching tires and, “FREEZE!”  A stampede of feet slapped grass and cement and rattled hedges outside my window as shadows flitted past.  A minute later, several ambled back and became menacing silhouettes outlined by strobing red and blue lights. They laughed among themselves.

“…like roaches!” one of them yelled.

Though the cops had cleared the corner, everybody knew the crowd had simply relocated to one of the other parking lots.  As kids, before we ever committed a crime, ‘hood life taught us to scatter reflexively at the sight of a police cruiser, period.  It was a joke, or a dangerous form of Tag.  You’re it.  

My dad’s lawnmower-snores rumbled through the apartment, unbothered by the ritual outside.  I laced up my sneakers. I was tired of being treated like an interloper.  I knew my family was too poor to move anywhere else, so I crouched on my bed, listening to dad’s steady snores, then climbed out my window.

Present.

Looking back, that was around the time I found the first gun I’d ever own, just laying in the grassy field beside my parking lot – the same field we’d cross to get to the bus stop, or when running from cops.

Last week, I heard on the news that someone there did a drive-by shooting, hitting three teens standing on the sidewalk near that bus stop, across from the police substation.  The assailant got away.  It seems nothing has changed except the generation.  I can’t help but wonder – was there so much crime, really, because our way of life in the projects was anti-police, or were we behaving criminally because police were anti-us, and we didn’t have anything to lose?

For me, the art exhibit photo merges past and present desperations.  In the past, perhaps, one of those hands is mine, reaching toward the police for help.  Presently, those hands seem to embody the pervading fear of police that people of color have – hands held up defensively, pleading, STOP… ENOUGH… WAIT… JUST FIVE MORE MINUTES…

It’s as if those hands know that to keep their freedom and bodies intact, while facing impossible odds, they must learn to part the sea.  They’ll need a miracle. 

AUTHOR’S NOTE: This literally came to me in a dream – I feel like God told me to write this song.

When I heard about Jesus,
God’s promise of a new start,
I found the joy I had hunted
could be a sun in my heart.

I heard this song in a dream,
got up in the middle of night,
and wept as I started writing
because I knew it was right.

When I found out about Jesus
something leapt inside my heart;
I found the joy I was hunting
had hunted me from the start!

I had looked for joy at parties,
but it wasn’t found in music,
neither did I find joy’s secret
when I searched all of my friends.

But then I found my Savior,
unlocking the Source in my heart,
and learned the joy I’d hunted
had been calling out from the start!

I used to think joy was dollars,
but greed is never content,
so I worked harder and harder –
thank God, we know how this ends!

I finally accepted Jesus,
it wasn’t too late to start;
now joy is blinding inside me,
now I have a sun for a heart! 

The mind amazes me – how it can be the only power we have over attitude; how, though we can’t change our circumstances, our attitude can change the way we experience events.  It brings to mind the way we experience a roller coaster ride – choosing between an attitude of faith or doubt.  If I doubt the safety of the harness, question if it will hold, it will be a terrifying ride, hands clenched to the lap bar, feet dug into the floor, eyes closed and likely feeling miserable.

But if I choose to live in faith that the safety harness is strong enough to hold me, then I can focus on enjoying the ride.  I can open my eyes, lean into every turn, throw my hands in the air and surrender to the thrill of it.  Nothing on the ride has changed, the trajectory of the ride was already determined, every curve, every loop, the length.  But inwardly, my experience was drastically different – faith felt like heaven, doubt felt like hell.

It’s pretty obvious the metaphor for spiritually and life itself; and, admittedly, the rollercoaster is a little cliche.  Still… I am convinced that God has laid out a track for each of our lives, and while we can make certain choices – keep our hands on the bar or throw them skyward – much of our lives are beyond our control.  Who knows?  Only thing I do know is that God commands us to love our fellow man, which, if applied as a life principle, leads to a way of life – a track.  So, once I committed to this way, it locked in the basic trajectory of my life, the circumstances I would find myself in, the people I’d encounter along the way, the trials and storms and temptations I’d face.

So, now all I can change is my attitude toward those events.  When I doubt God, I find myself afraid to love others, afraid that my kindness will be mistaken for weakness, afraid I’ll be rejected or disappointed, afraid I’ll be taken advantage of.  Prison is hard enough, and I sometimes fear that trying to love my fellow prisoners will turn me into prey.

Yet, when I’ve chosen to trust in God, I’ve felt an explosion of joy in my soul when I surrender to the love, let it shine forth.  God says, “When the Lord takes pleasure in anyone’s way, He causes even their enemies to make peace with them.”  (Proverbs 16:7)  God takes pleasure in our ways when we love one another, forgive, show mercy, etc.  And He keeps His people safe.  Granted, there are times God asks us to sacrifice and suffer for a higher purpose, but generally, a lot of our suffering is avoidable – if we’ll just trust and obey.  

So, often, my fears are unfounded because God is the X-factor.  Sure, without God, people may treat me a certain way, or when I do things for my own purposes people may prey on any vulnerable area, but when I am sincerely trying to do God’s will, the normal laws of human nature don’t apply.  Rather, God is involved because God is love, and so unexpected things occur – a cruel person suddenly is kindly toward me, the bully finds someone else to pick on, the thief decides not to steal from my cell.  

Like I said, it amazes me how powerful our attitudes can be.  Though the outward reality of being in prison has not changed for me, my attitude of faith has changed the way I experience prison life – I’m not afraid.  Rather, I’m filled with joy.  I have thrown my hands in the air, surrendered to the will of God, and now I just enjoy the ride.

I want to get out of prison.  As a Christian, this desire hasn’t decreased at all – but my reasons for wanting to get out have changed, some of them, at least.  Before, I just wanted to return to my old, pre-prison life.  Over time, I began to pray for God to let me demonstrate my repentance, promising I would serve Him better if I were free, help those in need.  Those of us in prison who identify as Christian have probably all prayed and promised some variation of that.  Repeatedly.  It’s been about twelve years since I last did.

And God answered me!  Just not by granting my request.  Rather, God first answered with a question He wanted me to contemplate, and I could sense the question like a rock in my gut. “If you won’t serve me wholeheartedly now, in a place and situation with fewer temptations and distractions, what makes you think you’ll serve me when free, when inundated with many of the same choices and temptations that condemned you to begin with?”

My initial reaction was to argue that I had changed.  But had I, really?  Maybe I wasn’t selling drugs or using them, but I had no trouble with fighting if the situation arose.  I could also turn a blind eye to the needs of those around me.  And I had this attitude that because I was in prison, I could do whatever it took to survive, to do my time.  I realized I didn’t really stand for anything; rather, I was like a chameleon, adapting to my surroundings.

But in my heart, I wanted to be authentic, to be the same person God wanted me to be regardless of where I was living, regardless of being imprisoned or free.  I prayed, “God, how can I possibly serve you right here, on death row?”  All I heard was silence, as if my heart wasn’t quite ready for God’s response.  Nevertheless, my question seemed to hover before my eyes everywhere I went.

Then, one day, God suddenly broke into my thoughts.  I was in my cell working on an art project when I saw this vision of myself putting together a bag of commissary items and handing it to an elderly, less-fortunate prisoner.  He had a very abrasive personality (almost nobody liked him, including me), so I didn’t want to give him anything.  Further, he lived on another pod.

Attempting to set aside the man’s grumpiness and my personal dislike, I asked, “Lord, how would I even get it to him?  You know the guards won’t just let me walk over there and pass it to him – it’s against the rules!”  In answer, God brought another scene to mind:  me walking toward my pod’s door, carrying the goodie bag. That was it.

I got the message, “Just do what I tell you to do.”

So, I headed toward my pod’s door, bag in hand.  As I approached, the pneumatic door hissed open.  Looking up at the control booth, I saw no guard.  And coming around the corner was the very person I was to give the bag to, hobbling along with his cane.  “Hey!” I exclaimed.  

The old man recoiled and screamed, “Hey!”  Then he eyed me warily.  I quickly stepped into the hall and thrust the bag into his free hand, saying, “Uh… God wanted you to have this…”  I felt weird saying it, though he seemed unfazed.  In fact, he brightened.

“Okay!  Thanks!  I gotta see the nurse,” and he shuffled off, rattling the bag as I stepped back into my pod.  I was a little stunned about how it’d all played out.

A guard appeared in the control station’s window ten feet in front of me and saw the open door.  She gestured angrily, as if I’d opened the pod door.  I shrugged at her and walked away, hearing the door hiss and bang shut behind me.

Now I understood.  I didn’t need to know how God would accomplish his goals.  To be of service is simple. I need only to maintain a humble, willing and obedient heart – and do what God tells me to do, when He tells me to do it, how He tells me to do it.  Period.  

Whether I’m in prison or out of it, if my heart’s in the right place, I am useful to God’s purposes.

Of course, I still want to get out of prison.  Only now, getting out isn’t a precondition God must meet in my life before I’ll serve Him.  

Amen. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  George Wilkerson lives on Death Row in NC. I think that this piece, more than any other shared here, is the greatest reflection of the person I have come to know. George is an accomplished poet, writer and artist. He is the author of Interface and Bone Orchard, as well as co-author of Crimson Letters and Beneath Our Numbers. More of his work can be found at katbrodie.com/georgewilkerson/.

Mr. Wilkerson can be contacted at:
George T. Wilkerson #0900281
Central Prison
P.O. Box 247
Phoenix, MD 21131

He can also be contacted via textbehind.com

1. routinely waking up at 4 a.m. while the prison sleeps. it’s as if the concrete softens when foamed in silence.

2. filling my clear plastic tumbler with scalding water, scooping in dusty coffee, then watching it bloom through the water. like the emotion i feel when my girlfriend laughs at my jokes.

3. when my buddy Kenny (whose dementia makes him unsteady as hell) suddenly buckled at the knee, i caught him just inches off the floor.  in front of witnesses.

4. when I called my elderly mother, i honestly thought my sister had answered – so strong, steady, and wrinkle-free, her voice.

5. the perfectly shaped handprints on the floor of Cliff’s cell.  he’s ratcheted out so many push-ups in the same spot, his palmsweat has blackstained the gray cement.

6. remembering how respect washed across our prison chaplain’s face her first day, when she borrowed my Bible to locate a verse and discovered my underlines, highlights, and notes covering every      single      page.

7. when I saw white dust all over the navy blue apron draped across my chest during my haircut, i thought it was baby powder, not gray hair.

8. i am still grateful for the tingly feeling in my belly that signals a great poem idea, though it also means i need to shit.

9. i love how loopy time is.  despite having been in prison seventeen years, freedom feels fresh as yesterday.  at the same time it feels like prison is all i’ve ever known. 

10. the euphoria triggered by late-afternoon light.  it has a mystical, dreamlike quality.  rocks spew water and walls crumble at a word in light like this.
    it reminds me:  anything is possible.

I. chambered

emerging from an ink-filled
womb – that’s how it feels:  the visitation

room is a quarter mile from death row
down steep half-dark corridors

except the last chamber-locked hallway
whose walls consist of frosted plexiglas panels

ablaze with light from outside.
as if protesting my arrival, the last pneumatic

sallyport door shrieks
and the guards and i flinch

and stumble down the hall.  blinking rapidly
i wonder,

as dazzled as they are, whether my eyes
will be able to hold yours.

II. churning

my heart feels like my eyes,
hot and bloodshot with nerves
and excitement.  it’s been a long time

since I’ve been anything
more than a foggy thought
or disembodied voice

on the phone to those i love.  i marvel
at my callused hands, how blurry they are
speed-shuffling cards i smuggled into the  booth.

Kat, there’s so much i want to show you!
(like the symbol i designed by combining the marks
beside our signatures:  your paw print, my peace sign)

but first i need you to see me
perform a magic trick
to reconcile the illusive conflict

between Fate and Free Will:  how it’s possible
that privilege and poverty marked us early
enough to make our past lives

and the paths we chose from there
seem almost completely other
to each other – yet both our souls

and hearts in recent months sensed the irresistible
power of agapé and poetry
seeming to churn and turn

the very earth and stars
beneath our feet, to bring us
here, as kindreds.

III. luminosity

and there you are, pushing the door
shut behind you, smiling prettily in anticipation.
we greet each other from feet away.
you take your seat and frown

at the plexiglas between us, the bars,
squinting and muttering something like,
“It’s a little hard to see your face – the light
coming in behind me

is making me see my own reflection.”
having been down here before, this hindrance
isn’t new to me, but to hear your frustration,
to witness your shifting and determination, the poet

in me thinks, you are the perfect embodiment
of empathy, the effort it takes to see
past ourselves to an other.  the moment
your gaze clicks into mine

i feel my blood thrum and body harden
into a real human being.  “There you are!” you say,
sounding so delighted
to see me, i struggle not to cry.

IV. luminaries

i think, fuck
my trick for a minute
as we start sharing skin and ink.  i unbutton
this red jumpsuit, slip it to my waist.
i remove my shirt to show you LOVE
NEVER FAILS tattooed in sturdy letters
across my chest.  you lift up your shirt
sleeve to show me the plump sugar
skull on your upper arm.  we compare
sprinkles of moles that appear in similar spots
on our bodies:  forehead, cheek, neck, collarbone, so close
to the glass our breath smokes against it.
by the time i remember the cards
there’s no real need for tricks or explanations,
and it feels irreverent to use magic
to describe the miraculous –
that we met;
      that you drove for hours
          to spend minutes with me
          in a suffocating prison visitation booth;
     that throaty laugh – how
when we speak it feels like freedom
in my mouth, how
with you i feel
                                                i’m home.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  George Wilkerson lives on Death Row. He is an accomplished poet and writer with a unique style and a solid commitment to his craft. I know when I see a submission from George, I am in for a treat, and I am grateful to be able to share his work. He is consistent, he is original, he is thought-provoking. He is only an occasional contributor to WITS because he is working on his own book projects, and he is also a co-author of Crimson Letters. To enjoy more of George’s work, visit katbrodie.com/georgewilkerson/.

Mr. Wilkerson can be contacted at:
George T. Wilkerson #0900281
Central Prison
P.O. Box 247
Phoenix, MD 21131

He can also be contacted via textbehind.com

In the free-world separating true worshippers from fake can be difficult. No doubt, some are true to what they believe, and for them, their faith defines their identity. In prison sorting the true worshippers from the fake is nearly impossible, many ‘in it’ only for what they can get in return.  In here we have little variety, so the little variety offered, multiplies in significance.

Prison-issue anything is homogenous, monotonous, bland, devoid of personality.  Even one’s personality can start to look prison-issued unless one actively strives to individuate – by getting sleeves of bad tattoos, for instance.  Religious affiliation also offers a chance to stylize and spice it up a bit since each religion gives access to exclusive privileges. 

If one registers as Jewish, he can receive a ‘special diet’ tray at meals, prepackaged Kosher food that’s fresh and edible, especially compared with typical prison-made grub, which is often congealed, stale, and wilted.

To prevent a choke hazard – think garrote – necklaces are prohibited.  However, if registered as Catholic, one may place an order with a vendor for a fancy rosary.  Nothing displays one’s piety (and class) like gold-fixtured, dried-blood-looking rosary beads made from compressed rose petals.

Muslims get access to Kuffs (knitted skullcaps) of various colors, and giving alms to the less-fortunate is obligatory.  For some guys the deciding factor is the stylish cap that highlights their eyes.  For the indigent, the guarantee of commissary items from their brethren is the appeal – plus they get a couple of annual feasts and can brag about (or sell) the lamb, fried chicken, hot sauce, and delicate flaky baklava they get to eat that we don’t.

Back in 2009, tobacco products were banned in state facilities, including prisons, but not for Native American practitioners, for whom tobacco is an essential element in praying.   Overnight the Native population exploded from two people to thirty. Death Row’s population is only about 140.  Each man lined up outside, stepped to the center of the sacred prayer circle, and the chaplain would hand him a medicine cup containing a teaspoon of pungent tobacco pressed into it’s bottom like a fat brown quarter.  They could smoke it in their pipe, burn it in their smudge pot, sprinkle shreds of it into the wind – or secretly smuggle it back to their cellblock and sell it for a dollar per hand-rolled cigarette at least.  They could easily get five bucks for that teaspoon – that’s 20 ramen soups or 25 coffee packets: that’s nine stamps or, for the druggies, five pills; or for the perverted, a blowjob from Randy.  The Natives also get an annual feast they can brag about or sell food items from.

We can register with only one faith group at a time, but are permitted to change faiths every 3-4 months.  That alone should tell you something about the waxing and waning of devotion in prison.  Often, when one changes religions, his former faith’s paraphernalia – now contraband in his hands – finds its way to the black market.  Headbands and Tupperware sacred-item boxes, prayer rugs, Kufis and Rasta caps, thick Bible dictionaries, prayer beads and shiny crucifixes. It’s all for sale.

Back when they banned tobacco, I registered as Native American so I could smoke and sell tobacco three days a week.  I did this for years, despite being a professing Christian.  Eventually, I felt so guilty that I left the prayer circle and re-registered as a Protestant.  That first Sunday rolled around and I had no intention of attending church services with some I knew were hypocrites.  Lying in bed, fiending for a cigarette, I heard a voice in my head that I attribute to God sounding like Charleton Heston in that old movie in which he played Moses.  It was a deep, authoritative voice, with a slightly ironic tone.  He said, “You went outside to smoke three times a week for an hour at a time for three years straight and missed not one day.  In the rain.  In the freeze.  In the scorch.  In the ants.  You skipped weekly movies.  You skipped recreation.  You went through the strip searches… And you can’t go to church twice a week because of the hypocrites?  So, there weren’t any hypocrites in the circle?   Well, maybe not now, not since you quit going.”  Of course I’m paraphrasing, not quoting verbatim, but you get the point.

I got out of bed and went to church.  And I haven’t missed a day since, even after we Christians lost our three annual feasts we used to humble-brag about.  I also no longer pass judgment on who’s real or who’s a hypocrite because I realize that despite being a sincere worshipper, I often do things to make this hard life a little softer, which from an outside perspective probably makes me look fake as hell.  Even so, I am a Christian… meaning I’m forgiven, not flawless.

To demonstrate my devotion, I own the most expensive Bible in our small congregation, ornate, leather-bound, handmade (in China).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  George Wilkerson lives on Death Row. He is a talented writer with a unique style, and a solid commitment to his craft. I know when I see a submission from George, I am going to enjoy the read, and I am going to share his work. He is consistent, he is original, he is thought-provoking. He is only an occasional contributor to WITS because he is working on his own book projects, and he is also a co-author of Crimson Letters. I am grateful he takes the time to share his voice here.

Mr. Wilkerson can be contacted at:
George T. Wilkerson #0900281
Central Prison
P.O. Box 247
Phoenix, MD 21131

He can also be contacted via textbehind.com

a hairy bear-of-a-man, my dad knew
only how to love and fight death
matches.  unless knocked unconscious
or it was broken up, somebody was doomed
to die.  simple as that.
to beg my mom not to leave, my dad
shoved a pistol into her lipsticked mouth.
she left him anyway, daring
to live – and, if possible,
he adored her even more for it.  Sometimes
violence is the only love one gets.  my dad

used to brag
                 about getting his top four front teeth
knocked out.  they’d been surgically replaced, twice –
courtesy of the U.S. Army.  first time, a boxing match.
second time was the story
he told, retold, and retold.  he’d tilt back his head, yawning
open his mouth to display the gunmetal rears
of those perfectly machined Army teeth.  “See?
I was arguing with my ex-wife and called her a bitch.
That damned fool shot up and kicked my teeth
down my throat.  I never called her a bitch again.
Not to her face,” he’d chuckle.  he’d show photos
of my mom’s brother, a taekwondo master.  in one
a three-foot-high stack of red bricks parted
left and right in neat waves, frozen mid-air
by the camera, my uncle’s brutal chop caught
cracking through the bottom brick.
sometimes love needs violence like that.  a heart attack

killed my dad during my murder trial.
i was relieved because he had sworn to God
to get us both shot to pieces by the police
right there in the courtroom if I got convicted –
and I wasn’t quite as eager to die
while attempting to escape my death
sentences, my two failed suicides aside.

ten years later my tiny Korean mom came to visit me
on death row.  i had to ask, “Mom, why
did you even marry my dad to begin with?
You two were so different, I just can’t understand it.”
she dropped her wrinkled gaze, as if weary or
embarrassed, then looked up with eyes ablaze.  i flinched
as she launched into a story.  “You father was so handsome!
Not like after he got fat.”  ((she pronounced “after”
as apter and “fat” as pat)) she bloated out her cheeks
to show “fat face” then slowly exhaled, making a scraping,
bubbling, throaty growl
to indicate visceral disgust.  it summarized her
feelings following their divorce.  then she went back
to being dreamy-eyed and tender.

“He came into bar with friend.  Me and my sister there. 
They so handsome in uniform.  You father was better looking.”
she lowered her voice at the end as if revealing her secret.
“It was disco bar.  He ask me to dance – Oh, my God,
he such bad dancer!  But cute.  You father, he dance
like this.  No matter song, he dance like this.”  she sprang up
in the cramped visitation booth to demonstrate
a big man, a big moment.  i ducked

to study her
through the six-inch-tall, two-foot-wide, waist-level window –
through the black iron bars and double-paned, grimy plexiglas
as graffiti-scratched as a nasty gas station bathroom stall,
through greasy handprints holding hands through the glass,
through crusty bodily fluids, through all this history
of lust, pain, anger and disgust, loneliness and madness and
beauty, all of which tried to distract me
from my origins, my heritage, my parents.  but I was, finally,
ready to see them as real people, not just symbols
of dysfunction.  and so I watched

my mom raise her delicate fists, spin them one-over-the-other
like Ali hitting a speed bag at heart-level, while two-stepping
back-and-forth, twisting slightly at the hip
on the back-step to toss a take-a-hike thumb over
her shoulder.  “You see?  Like this…  Like this…
All the song, like this…” she said giggling
and panting like she did forty years earlier
at nineteen.  she was breathless with adrenaline.
i had never seen her like this.  so animated. 
so alive.
i laughed too, because I saw how it must’ve been.

in the midst of all her teasing about my dad’s bad dancing
i spotted the operative phrase:  “all the songs.”
translation:  she stayed on the dance floor with him,
laughed and joked with him, tripped and fell head-first
in love with him.  it was simple, it was pure, it was even
atavistic, drawing on a primitive period when a violent
amount of eye-contact, body grinding, pantomime
and empathy’s grunting communicated everything.  when
each had to give the other their absolute undivided
attention or they’d miss something.  neither spoke
the other’s native language, but the tongue of raw humanity
transcended their cultural barriers.  they were smitten.

it was only twelve years, seven pregnancies, and five kids
later, once my dad’s schizophrenia began to speak, that
his violence turned divisive.  till then, my mom said,
“A lot of Korean, they hate American soldier.  Every time
we go out people cuss us, spit at me.  We fight
together.  But you father, he very proud,
very strong.  Always he want fight for me.   A lot
of people go hospital.”  she was virtually swooning
and had to sit back down.  i did not know this woman.

within weeks my parents married, having a traditional
Korean wedding, yet their honeymoon attitude was ruined
when the Army wouldn’t acknowledge it as binding:  it was time
for my dad to return to America but the Army stiff-armed
my mother.  when he tried to go AWOL she urged him
to just come back.  he promised and she promised
to wait for him.

the Demilitarized Zone was a strip of land that ran
like a ribbon the entire east-to-west length between
North and South Korea.  it represented the fragile
nature of peace between enemies who used to be family.
it was off-limits.                                           if either side
spotted anyone within that tense ribbon of land, they
might shoot without warning.  sometimes the North
took pot-shots at American soldiers, who helped the South
patrol it, on foot.  the terrain was jungle like, riddled
with landmines.  ((it described my parents’ post-divorce
dynamic exactly)) the DMZ was aptly nicknamed
the Dead Man’s Zone.  the only way to reach my mom
was for my dad to get re-assigned to the DMZ.
it took a year.

“He came back for me.  You father.  He came back for me. My family
say he wouldn’t.  Everybody say he wouldn’t, say he only want
one thing.  They make me give up
baby.  They say they kill baby if I don’t
give him up.  But you father come back.
He so upset when no baby there.  So upset.  But
he understand.”  she started to cry.  i didn’t know
what to say
so I said nothing.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  George Wilkerson lives on Death Row. He is a talented writer with a unique style, and a solid commitment to his craft. He is an occasional contributor to WITS, a co-author of Crimson Letters, an eye-opening book released in 2020, and his writing can be found on several other platforms. We always enjoy hearing from him – simply put, I look forward to every submission he sends in, knowing he will never disappoint.

Mr. Wilkerson can be contacted at:
George T. Wilkerson #0900281
4285 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, NC 27699-4285

His features typically dour, Peter
seemed transfigured today when
he returned from wherever. 
He was giddy, like  a person after

sex, “I just came
from visiting the orthopedist at
an outside hospital.  She said
my herniated discs are squeeze-

ing against my sciatic nerve.  It’s
excruciating, and I need surgery.
But guess what?”  I shrugged.
“On the way back, they opened

the window a little.
I pressed my face into the gap
the whole time.”  I noticed red
parallel welts tracked up his chin,

lips, and cheeks – two inches
apart. Even a transport car’s air
is restrictive.  As an extension of
prison, it’s a portable cell with

an incarcerated atmosphere:
A death row prisoner cramped in
back, bound in full-restraints –
handcuffs, ankle-shackles; waist

chains connecting them – behind
a stab-proof stainless steel cage
protecting armed guards up front.
Evidently, the line dividing freedom

from imprisonment is thinner than
a thought.  Even now his face is
pressed against that two-inch gap,
                        mushrooming out,

tongue flapping happily in wind. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.  George Wilkerson lives on Death Row. He is a talented writer with a unique style, and a solid commitment to his craft. He is an occasional contributor to WITS, a co-author of Crimson Letters, an eye-opening book released in 2020, sharing the voices of those living on North Carolina’s Death Row, and his writing can be found on several other platforms. We always enjoy hearing from him.

Mr. Wilkerson can be contacted at:
George T. Wilkerson #0900281
4285 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, NC 27699-4285