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recognizes the possibilities of self-expression,
perhaps the walls crack a little. Perhaps. Words
can, indeed, turn them around, but sometimes
having all the right words is small change.

“Before despairing, speak of it,” said a wom-

an one day in class. Even when writing of
despair, there’s the fact—named and held to
the light for a moment—maybe even under-
stood.
WITHOUT WALLS/FREE SPACE is continuing to
work at a children’s center, a drug clinic, and
another women’s prison. It’s important to main-
tain the lifelines between people on the outside
and those inside.

But what happened at the Women'’s House of
Detention can easily happen again. Especially if
publishing is, as it should be, part of the writing
project. Prison writers have a right to be heard
as does any writer. Their voices are too impor-
tant to be missed. Publishing is part of the art of
not bowing. Each time a man or woman in a cell

Next Time
(group poem from the videotape
of the same name)

You don’t hear me
You don’t see me

I’'m the one just a step behind

you

a split second before the light changes on the
corner.

The face that breaks the glass without a sound

The hands that take your money on a
screaming train uptown.



Ladies. | had nowhere to take myself tonight
Except to myself

To my own face

Reflected in yours

And my own voice

telling me

THERE IS NO NEXT TIME FOR ANY OF US

Just the husbands and families waiting
Just the habits and fast money waiting

The kids in the street

The kids in strangers” homes
The kids in our bellies

The kids we are inside

And the lies we tell ourselves
To go on living

LISTEN

No one got over on you tonight
No one lied here tonight

We told the truth

And the truth is what you see before
your eyes

Ladies

Before you forget, ladies,

Till the “next time” . . ..

My best.

Carol Muske is a New York poet and assistant editor of
Anteus. Her book, Camouflage, was published in 1975
(University of Pittsburgh Press). She directs the prison
program Art Without Walls/Free Space at Bedford Hills
Correctional Facility for Women.

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