Prose of a Con

Poetry and Prose by Russell Wardlow

Love

Codependency

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I wrote this poem and read it to a few people, it captivated them, I read it to another person that also is a poet, though I don’t consider myself a poet but he asked if I had a title, and I said no, not really, its kind of a performance poem…and he said this should be named codependency. Because that’s what he hears and he spoke on the importance of women, especially young women seeing this because the very real nature of toxic love becoming a codependency doing more harm than good. He asks his daughter, do you love him or are you just used to him? It’s a thin line between love and hate, but love is on one side, is something he also said. I wrote this knowing the truth it had been in most of my relationships, a cycle I loved but needed to fall out of love with. I used to think crazy love meant you loved more, but that’s not true..so I hope you can really read this and get something out of it because for me, relationships were always my trigger, either needing them closer or needing that closure. Emotions blur lines, what you may believe you are seeing clearly, you aren’t, that’s your fear of loneliness more often than not. Be brave, step back, and re-evaluate, because the loss of love may hurt you, but love doesn’t hurt

“Codependency”
I love love
I love you, love
but love, your love is killing me!
slowly..
you killin Me!
you killin me Slow!
you killin me Slow!…ly
sounds of glass chandeliers
marble vases
life sized mirrors
ceiling to floor windows
all combusting and shattering at once
added with the desperate sound of nails torturously dragging across the chalk board agonizingly slow to the point of insanity
mixed with the shrill screams of your voice in my head telling me that I’m worthless, you hate me, you regret us, but you..love.. me?
ahhhh, fuck! I love too!
trapped inside of this house of hoarded noises and horrors
as if we are inside the box of Pandora!
pandemonium is a regiment
panoramic malevolence
panorama of medicine
pan the cameras to catch the very moment you wouldn’t let me in
pointless pictures, a million hollow smiles reflected within our rusted frames
you know I tried but I’m teetering a cliff and you driving me crazy! i’ll swerve forreal! what?! you think that I wont?!
no
yes
stop
go
please
no thanks
forget it
forget you
remember I love you
I hate you
take me back
take that off
take it back
take this
take that
all you do is take!
take a hike!
what will it take?
take your time..
well take off then!
take 3!
let’s try this again..
look, I’ve messed up, ok I’m messed up
a torrent of text messages meshed with a plethora of ignored calls
then our verbal brawls
your words are scars
which reflect my flaws
I built up walls
you break them down, then break me down, back up!
rifle directed at you
ruger directed at me
I’m speaking metaphorically, love, we’re killing each other
or maybe you’re just killing me
did I fall in love or in obligation
fearing how you’d handle my departure and having to cope with the aches of loneliness more than the brevity of patience
until you’ve known love you don’t have any idea what pain is
lost looking for the right one, but what if they do not exist
at least I have you hear, and you have me, it’s not settling
every land is occupied by settlers, its how we build a home and a family
you remind me of so many things that I can never let go of
we’re one in the same
feigning fangs of ferocity and fear
its a thin line between love and life
symbolized within three fine thin strikes
across my wrist
tattoos of my affection passion and strength
and I dedicated it to you, you like it?
I couldn’t afford you roses or your name
but all roses wilt and tattoos get lazored off but this, THIS will forever remain
what a coincidence, we’re like twins, yours looks the same!
toast, to your love, whether potion or poison
tears enhance the taste of champagne
blood blends better in red wine
yea, we’re so crazily refined
love, we been through enough and came too far to give up
laughing remembering those times we should’ve and tried to, but never gave up
but what a beautiful massacre life and love is
inhaling your toxins, sipping your venom and swallowing the poisonous bliss of each other
I’m numb to it, calloused by the jagged edges of mutilation
finding relief in the moments you slow things down and
kill me slow, because I rather you do it then me…
what can I say, life is dark, love is light and I rather die illuminated
I love love, and you love it too
but do you love me…too?
because I.
still.
love.
you…
—
“I feel the storm”
I hear the storm
do u hear the storm
I feel the storm
I feel we’ve been warned
I feel like I’m cold,
and then I feel warm
I keep trying to change,
because I feel worn
I feel like I’m swarmed
but this is my norm
I try to do good, to deflect your harm
reach out with your arm
but the distance is more than your arm
sometimes we’re both off, and then we’re both on
and then I go off, and you just go on
then one of us yawns…
we been at this since dawn
why drag this on?
then you wave your arm,
like a magic wand
like I will be gone
and if I turn away…
then you play that song
that had us both drawn
I’m flattered but mad at your attitude
you take the avenue
I take the alley, but we both turn around like we inside a cul-de-sac
and meet on the street where this started at
I raise my starter cap
then you hook your hair
behind your ear
we put our cars out of gear
the headlights shine bright thru our windshield
we both looking forward
like we both want this
so we open our doors
and we walk thru the rain
we’re soaked in our pain
but live for this moment when we stand in both lanes
and kiss away all our shame
and all of those names
and all of the thangs
that had us both drained
because we’re both vane
although it won’t last…
so when we let go
its a thing of the past
and its on a string
that we won’t cut off
because love, isn’t something that we can just shrug off
we both feel the storm
but if we stay stuck together, then we can keep warm

Top 10 Reasons Men in Prison May be Bigger Catch than your average “Swipe Right”

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FITNESS- I mean in prison we take care of ourselves for the most part, clean, organized, we’re preserved, with all those keto and kale lifestyles, we have the kilometer lifestyle, weights have their way of sculpting and bulging the body in more desirable ways. Testosterone and Vitality will be at the max, after the first round of course, if you picking up what I’m putting down!

TRANSPARENCY- we live with our worst all out there, we have the elephants in the room being rode by our skeletons out of a wide open closet, no surprises, no sending our representative selves, no false advertisement, what u see before u get is more than you’ll ever know before an average first date
emotional availability-people are finding and reinventing themselves, trying to heal from their own scars by facing them daily, that vulnerability is found and explored on another level when a woman is involved because emotions aren’t a party topic on the yard, so you get the real tears from a Man, Wooo!

DEPTH-in prison that shallow shit is less existent, who are we to be so choosy and picky, plus we get a chance to know someone’s depth before appearance and sexual performance which is the true essence of love and relationships. Let’s be real, most people are surface dwellers, but us in prison learn from experience that it’s what’s beneath that counts, so bring your flaws, scars, and all!

SECURITY-if you at a grocery store and a dude comes up to you like, “what up ma” all you gotta say is my boyfriend just got home from doing ten plus years in prison, then he says, “goodbye ma” nuff said/ I mean I used to be that guy that stayed away from all dudes out of prison and their women and I don’t scare easy, I’m just not stupid. Men from prison are protective of what’s theirs, so being a prized possession is a plus, because no one steals from us inside or else, so damn sure not outside!

FORGIVENESS/UNDERSTANDING-we understand people have a past and have shame and guilt, we live in it daily, so you are able to have the release and heal with a kindred spirit that truly gets it, the weight of judgement isn’t a light load, we know how to forgive because we live to be forgiven, umm vulnerability is the new pheromones!

GPS-you always know where he is, and fear no competition, women aren’t plentiful here so no weekend sexcapades or surprise pregnancies. Loyalty is almost a given, all you have to do is pick up the phone, visit, or write back!

LISTENER-the world is so distracting right now, you get someone that has the luxury of being able to stop and be attentive and learn who you really are and help you figure even more of yourself out, you have men that not only listen, but actually wants to listen! Priceless! That shit is groundbreaking!

TRAINABLE-if all men are dogs, then at least we’re in a kennel and trainable before you take us home. I mean if the world can have all these lost, hurt dog commercials that make you wanna spend your money and take them home, then do a slow motion biopic on me and my environment, and I can make you just as sad and be all the more respectful, grateful and loyal to you too if you choose me and take me home! I don’t mind being trained, who I was at first obviously didn’t work out, cheers to new things!

DRIVE-we have creativity, we’ve fantasized and dreamed and found passion and sparked ideas in order to have a chance at a better life, in order to start over, all that takes time and planning, will, dedication, perseverance, reserve, strength, patience, spirit, faith, belief…we can help rejuvenate your energy, drive is infectious, lost and forgotten dreams become realized and seeked once again in the name of love, Prison Love!

ROMANCE-We have all the time to think of everything you say, the signs you give, trust me we see all the signs and remember more dates and moments than usual so we can create a display of love specifically catered to you. It’s the small things that we master and that count, so we’re creative with how we express our love and the things we say, whether in drawings and hand made cards, romantic, sensual, and deep letters, singing on the phone, and Prison Poetry(ehh mhm! bias admitted) is second to none! So imagine the effort that will be put in making you feel special when we’re home! You know how a man acts when he messed up and wants forgiveness knowing he’s in the dog house? Well that’s our normal! Can’t beat that! If someone expresses love better than a prisoner, then what the hell are you doing reading this?! You messing up!


Ha! No wonder the prison penpal and prison business is boomin! The Good in the Bad, ProseofaCon
Case made! Mic drop! So are we a catch or what?! Instagram Prison Version of “The Bachelor” coming soon!
Disclaimer: does NOT apply to ALL, but then again, what does?  

I’m back!

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Here I am world!!! I’m back!! Wooooo!
Just received my new tablet after this long ass dragged out Month without my baby (prison tears) but now things are back to normal. I feel like I swallowed a pack of Skittles, Merlot, and Red Bull! Feeling the options, the dapper and the energy! So what am I going to write about now? I don’t know because there’s been a lot on my mind, first off, shout out to my “prison wives” homegirls! Hope all is swell well! Shout out to everyone that don’t have a life like me, get up and do something! Shout out to my long lost brother, he just showed up on my jpay this morning!  The jpay has room for anyone else that wants to email me too, yea I sure don’t get bored and lonely in prison…NOOOOOTTTTT! Shout out to my son’s moms, they still doing a great job, way better than me right, oh and of course MY TWO BOYS JOSIAH AND TREYVAN! I’ve never known anything more beautiful and saucy! Shout out Lauren From Givabeat for seeing to it that I still keep writing by making sure I got a new tablet! Swag!! Not enough big hearts out there but Good thing I have the best ones on my team! Which brings me to the best BAB Deuce Deuce KATIE, You are every bit of inspiration as you are friend and family! Speaking of family, remember that life, happiness, success and love requires a team effort, we can’t all do it on our lonesome. “Coming together is a beginning, keeping together is progress, and working together is success” and OG MLK Jr said “change doesn’t happen on the wheels of inevitability, but through consistent struggle” embrace the struggle yaw, the hardships, the pains and let downs, the break ups and rejection, the distance and the discomfort it brings. Lastly before I leave, the posts about to be more live, so show some love and gravity if it pulls you, spend a few minutes with me and read on and share but if not, I leave you with this, so listen world, “if you live for compliments, you’ll die by criticism”

I’ll break a leg before you break my spirit
I’ll break my back before I run from the weight
If we break apart, yea, it might break my heart
But we can break down from getting too many breaks
And where would we go from there World?
I have less breaks than drive
So ride with me Life, but only if you believe there’s good in the bad, and lets see where this World takes us
-WayOfLife-
-YoungR.U.S.S.-
-ProseofaCon-

What’s the end goal of incarceration?

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What is the end goal of incarceration? what does the public expect the inmates to be once they come back into society? The real answer, not the clean cut formal department of justice answer, because that’s just pie in the sky salesman speak. I mean what do expect a child to do if you send them into timeout for being bad, but offer no instruction nor attempt to figure out what it is within them that causes them to do those things. Do you expect change, without correcting the problem? Adults don’t need to be told the why’s but their why’s need to be understood in order to have any hopes of an improved mindframe. You don’t send a child to timeout and surround them with temptation and the things that will only serve to make them worse, you structure their punishments in order to condition a better response and behavioral change. So how do you expect an adult to change when they may come from dysfunction, and you enhance those dysfunctions by throwing them into the center of even more dysfunctional people with no real requisite or structure of betterment. How can you speak to a person that only understands and knows struggle and pain and the worst sides of life, like betrayals of love, abandonment of family, alienation of friends, no problem solving, venting with dependencies, drugs, murder, abuse of all sorts and with no real identity and a constantly changing environment that surrounds them and clouds them with neglect and a society that offers them no respect, honor or family that gangs offer yet casting them out showing only fear, denigration and disrespect with every effort to say they are lesser while providing unrealistic expectations of achievement as if it is mutually inclusive and possible regardless the conditions they developed within. How can you say you understand if you offer opinion first before an ear, if you compare your experience to mine as if you overcame despite it all. How can a person know how to forgive when all they know is blame and revenge, when society hides their truth and hands down their responsibility on everything and everyone else but themselves yet you say I should come out better and fully functioning, knowing better and cherishing what I had yet prison shows the bare naked truth of society. Separation, segregation, prejudice, racism, lies, denial, depravity, alienation, classism, judgement, unforgiving, violent, anger, fear, escapism, loneliness, abandonment, addiction need I go on, because my closet is doorless and yours is vaulted now all of a sudden since I’m in this obvious prison and you hide within your prison you act as if you can speak down to me, as if I owe you something, as if I’m so unrepairable and my sin is so much grander than yours while your precious freedom makes money off my misery, offering me false hope. The best kept secret is that I am constitutionally a legal slave and you expect me to come out without trauma and be grateful? I was raised s a state ward, with an imprisoned mother battling depression alienation addiction and a father killed by her hand while pregnant with me because of his drunken abusive episode which I never found out til damn near 18. How do you speak to that person, how do you get through to them when all you see them as and throw them in is shit? I speak to that type everyday, because I am in that shit with them, these same people that could’ve killed me not because they hate me but because hate is all they know and society tells them its their fault, so fuck it right?! When they call out and hear of a close death, a cheating girlfriend, maybe she left, or likes her power in the phone, family distant and friends are a matter of convenience but yet society says don’t come back broken because you know better, we gave you a chance to heal and find yourself even though everyone outside lives as strangers trapped within their own prisons. I’ve offered my voice to friends with heartbreaks, addiction issues, suicidal thoughts, loneliness, health struggles, relationship problems, in need of life advice and an ear because I m going through it too, so I know it, I identify, I feel them and I I’m that ear daily for the worst people society casted out, real killers and molesters. I have answers for everyone but myself and two sons that barely know my voice, their mothers holding onto past pains, my siblings growing through life on their own, and a mom transitioning from prison, but who talks to me, what do u tell me that I haven’t told the mirror already, I get more judgment than help, we all do..I heard it all so just in case you didn’t know what its like, this is a fraction of what I embrace willingly daily

Love and Pain

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Love and Pain are both relationships, how can we move forward and find love, if we are still holding onto and committed to that past pain and let down? How can we find passion, purpose and meaning in things if all we rather be is comfortable? What breakthrough ever came from being comfortable? How can we ever free ourselves and find depth if all we do is run from struggle and hardships? These are the very things that shape us and give value to what we pursue and believe in, and if our belief systems are only coated in those moments when we feel the most at ease and comfortable, fearing getting truly involved because of the implications of being let down, then what do you really value besides fear? I say this because there are people I know and don’t know that are still trapped and I feel for them, because I used to be free and trapped too, but now I’m still in prison, which I don’t even see these walls anymore and I’m more free and at peace than I have ever been in my life. My scenery used to embarrass me, and I made all these concessions thinking I had to adhere to everyone else’s happiness since I’m the one in this overbearing situation…but those same things I used to struggle with out there, I’m finally getting thru with inside these walls. I mean I’m still human and struggle with love and wanting to be loved, but besides that, I don’t fear distance and being alone, I don’t fear not having anything because I’m quite content with nothing and working on myself and I even find more joy in giving to others even if I barely have enough. I live in hell and found the heaven in it. I stay engaged daily, I don’t see myself as this person that can only be hurt and let down that never let anyone down, nor do I see myself as only a screw up that has only hurt people and deserves no forgiveness because my identity isn’t in the next person but in how I can look in the mirror and keep working on making him the best person. That shit takes longer than a social media post but it sure feels good getting it out this way. I found my freedom in prison and somehow waiting to get free where so many are still in prison…life is beautiful, what a view.
Take a second to feel and embrace what it is that you feel, stop running, stop resisting, stop wanting everything the easy way, because you’ll get exactly what you put in, but don’t ask the same question afterwards. Just because technology makes communication faster, doesn’t mean it makes it easier, take time to know yourself and someone else…maybe understanding someone else’s pain will help you better see and understand your own and from there, who knows but with that knowledge-what a view!
R.U.S.S.

A Circle Has No End or Beginning

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A circle has no end or beginning, but it is ever revolving, and the more you travel, the more you will see what you first were blind too. So, at times I speak in circles, that way you will be able to revisit things you already were aware of, just maybe not conscious of, and you get a chance to see without blockers, so talking in circles isn’t as bad you they say
Parsing paradigms and piercing paradoxes are in someway my thought and writing style, I write perspective narratives and perspective verse poetry based from my wayward observations and experiences of Life and Imprisonment. I’ve come to see that those two experiences, while one is in freedom, and the other isn’t, both have more mirroring parallels and possibly aren’t so contrasting as they may seem. Just one population is more concentrated, and so the interactions of that population are more inflamed for lack of space and options-two things a civil society offers, but we adjust. Prison-the land of the Civilized Savages. It’s easier to question things when you add distance from the thing in question. Distance creates objectivity and room for thought.. so I think about “what if’s” a lot and the mortality of them, they speak to either a distant future or distant past, and mostly an impossibility
I believe one of the biggest “what if’s” are, what if you knew everyone’s truth, and they too, were privy of the real you? What if, everything you believed was exactly the contrar? Could you be brave enough to accept those new revelations, or would stubborness, fear, and the lack of idealism plague your growth? It takes questioning to learn more, but as we mature from our adolescent selves, ironically we question less, preffering comfort to re-construction. Somehow, the mere act of questioning is both brave and audacious, because of the way in which we cling to conventional norms and wisdoms. Conforming is the new tolerance, and individuality is the new prison, Welcome!
So here’s a question, can there be chaos without control, or control without chaos? Or simply, do they both feed off each other? We see life as if everything has an opposing force, instead of a complimentary one. Obviously, perception is reality. Along with the connotations attached to our complicated dubious and ambiguous langauge. Maybe control is chaotic, and chaos however, is a means of control. Maybe because the act of supplementing a control for chaos, creates conditioning. Yet, no control is constant, besides in the fact that it is just like life, therefore, constantly changing. We have frames, doctrines, laws, and paradigms that we use to identify and medicate the themes we come across in life, but those structures and foundations are constantly in a state of agitation, or change, as life evolves and we adapt. Therefore, control I believe, is chaotic, because we have to compliment chaos with order, it’s opposite, but does that mean that chaos is control, or does chaos merely beckon control? The latter would be obvious. Control is ever evolving and adapting, like lifes organisms and societies. In order to survive, control creates a norm, or certain conditions, so then life in itself is “Chaotic Control”-birthing a ceaseless cycle of conditioning
–
I tell her to stay
she try to go-
she try to stay
I try to leave-
like she is my tree
like she is my sleeve-
she try-on my heart
it is her size-
im wearing on her
and she wears me out-
the girls like a man
that show how he feel-
she see the girls
and see my appeal-
I try to split
banana won’t peel-
but she need a pill
because she feelin ill-
she keeping secrets
her secrets revealed-
when she get a drink
in to her gills-
there’s plenty of fish
but that ain’t the deal-
this is a pickle
but she can not dill-
what is the deal
she want me to kneel-
she try to feel
but she can not feel
so she play the field
now I’m in my feels
now I have a shield
still wondering if she’ll..
but she never will
–
do u love me, or u love me not?!
no really do u?
cuz my stomach in knots!
its just u promise a lot
then contradict with a thought
now my confidence at a loss
and u comprehend it as fault
u say its mine when we talk
like this shit all in my head?!
but all THAt I see is fog
I hear ur echoing heels
as they SLAP the side walk
I look up and ur lost
speaking my truth at a cost
what’s the point of a heart
if it only beats when its tossed
I wear it on my sleeves, maybe these sleeves should come off!
u say u love me don’t lie!
(gulp)Im drinking my pride
because I’m tryna hide
that I’m dying inside
fuck!
why should I cry?!
you just hate being alone!
u don’t know bout real love (hiccup)
ahhhh should give up
why do I even get up
stuck in my feels and all I feel is bitter
tasting the remnants of your lipstick glitter
the sweetest venom..
I secretly kiss your picture
and then I rip it
placing it in an envelope, reluctantly I send it
after I write a sentence
“only for your eyes…but I hope you dont get it”
–
she told me she love me
why won’t she cry for me
she told me she’ll never leave
why won’t she cry for me
she said she’d rather be nowhere but right here
why won’t she cry for me
she said there’s no one else like me
why won’t she cry for me
she said she has never felt like this before
why won’t she cry for me
she said she goes into a love portal when our lips collide
why won’t she cry for me
she said she feels so cold after we break away from our embrace
why won’t she cry for me
she said I’m not her first, but I am her first
why won’t she cry for me
she looks at me deep, with this question in her eyes
longing for some kind of answer
she always asks me how I feel
she wants to hear me say it
I say the exact same things she said
her look became distant
she found her answer
I didn’t notice
until she said goodbye
I reached for her, but it was too late, she slipped away
wanting things I could never give
looking for something I clearly couldn’t see
why can’t I cry for her…
I wish I could cry for her