Killing Me Softly: A Self Reflection

by Da’Shae Summer Breeze, Eastern Reception & Diagnostic Center

I sit in my cell inside the segregated Housing Unit at Eastern Reception/Diagnostic Center, confined away from the rest of its prison population. I am depressed, feeling as if I am being constantly deprived of the human kindness and standards of decency deserving of all human beings. It seems as if everyone wants to see me die. They kill me softly and slowly, but I refuse to die in the shadows. I come alive.

No matter what I endure while behind these prison walls, I am comforted by the fact that each new day is the beginning of a new state of things. From which I can extract flavor and benefits, more than those previously afforded to me and others. I understand that a great majority of people inside and in the free world are sincerely determined to see me treated fairly. They are advocating for my rights, pushing for better conditions of confinement and for programs that can successfully rehabilitate me back to greatness.

Even in the face of cruel and unusual punishment, I feel the providence of God, opening up a pathway of hope for me to walk upon, when my life’s burdens become too much to bear he carries me. Taking me into my zone. A little slice of heaven behind bars. Loudly I come alive. I am no longer faced with the penalty of death, I will not be killed softly. I am met with compassion interlocked with forgiveness. I conquer the cruelty, I destroy it. I refuse to eat from the garden of cruelty that grows on the prison yards. I already lost my freedom, liberties and my privileges, but I refuse to lose my true inner self.

I plant seeds of hope in the killing fields that spring forth in its seasons and bear fruit. I refresh daily with hope and infused with kindness. I exist, I come alive.