Small Children In Prison Poem by Elizabeth Padillo Olesen

'I only steal from the rich
Not from the poor,
I steal because I am hungry',
said the nine year old boy
as he was interviewed in jail.

Imprisoned for crimes
like stealing food to appease
hunger in the tummy,
Etsoy and others are caged like animals
sharing a pot of rice among
11 or 15 in-mates three times a day.

Mixed with adult criminals
charged with heinous crimes,
here they are in jail without pencil,
books, crayons and oil lamp,
Here they dread going to sleep,
scared of being raped.

And they look at the high fences
of concrete walls,
invincible by their bare hands
Here are fences that blind their eyes
from seeing the meeting point
between earth and sky.

Here are walls that deny them
to gaze at the sea, the boats,
the jeepneys, the ships and passers-by,
the birds perching on trees
and the rice fields at harvest time.
Yes, Etsoy and many more
Etsoys are in this jail
imprisoned, imprisoned
behind these high impenetrable walls.

Yes, the small children like Etsoy
behind these concrete walls.
are only called by numbers
or nicknames for who dare
to know their precious names?

Behind these high concrete walls
they are forgotten,
denied of their childhood and life.
And this prison
is their own
university of life.