broken bear

Here we were, driving to Wal-Mart on a munchie-fueled quest in our onesies at night to find snacks. Even the black cat that brought us to an eerie stop in the middle of the road by the cemetery couldn’t deter us. As we neared Albion, the pollution of fluorescent lights grew in the sky. I rolled my window down as we passed the prison to get a better look.
People, behind rows of towering fences wandered around the barren yard like zombies in a cage beneath those piercing lights. They hurt my eyes as they twinkled off the razor wire.
I suddenly felt sick.
This is how we treat our broken brothers and sister, by abusing the abused, an eye for an eye so the whole world can be blind. Like if we let them out, they’d run hungrily around town eating flesh like rabid bears.
All the conversations and political debate had never made me see how inhuman this is. This, I’ve been told, is the way to fix broken people, locking them in this hell on earth where not a tree grew, not a flower, only these damn lights drowning out the stars.
How can razor wire heal a bleeding heart.
There’s got to be a better way.
I could be in there with you, emptied of the right to live by a system of slavery.
Sometimes I’m a broken bear, just like you, and if I could turn off these damn lights for you, I would.