Heather Cook

Woking UK

Author of 6 humorous cat books and articles and numerous poems which have met with some success in competitions, including 3rd place in the Buxton Festival and a commendation in the Ware Poetry Competition. I write for pleasure and because I can't imagine ever not writing. For the past 8 years I have volunteered in a local closed male prison which has made me think deeply about incarceration and the impact on prisoners and their families.

Date poem was written 19th April 2020

Covid Cell

My days are full of birdsong

and missing you.

I see you in your cell

gulping air, a car-sick dog;

you lean against the wall,

your face against the cobwebbed slits,

sucking in the rancid dust

that coats the walls and binds

the sickening odours of incarceration.

What do they say,

the ones who think their son

could never end up there?

'Don't do the crime

if you can't do the time.'

How rousing is that rhyme,

how comforting the Daily Mail,

how good to know that life is fair

in 2020 on this fine spring day.