Gustav Hauck had spent thirty years in a Texas prison <br />and how he wound up in Coney Island <br />married to a woman in a wheelchair <br />I didn’t know nor did I know of his crime <br />but that was long ago <br />now he was an old man with stories to tell <br />and I listened because there was always <br />a kernel of wisdom to them <br />and never bitterness <br />in fact the man emanated joy. <br />John Bannon had just finished describing <br />the three days he spent in the Brooklyn House <br />of Detention on Atlantic Avenue <br />when Gustave jumped right in saying: <br />“That place is Paradise compared to a jail cell in Texas. <br />One time they put Duke Durando <br />in with me. A big man, so no matter what he did <br />I couldn’t say nothing <br />but the man talked in his sleep. <br />Night after night. Now I thought <br />I could deal with anything but the night is special <br />in prison cause that’s escape time, <br />when you dream of the life <br />you don’t have but might have. <br />Without dreams you get all tied up in knots. <br />Anyway, Duke kept it up and I couldn’t sleep <br />in the day time cause you weren’t <br />allowed in your cell <br />so I started praying for him to get a heart attack <br />now I know I shouldn’t but desperation <br />made me a sinner. <br />When that didn’t work I told him to shut up. <br />Sure he said, not taking offense but that night <br />the talking continued cause he didn’t have <br />no control over the matter. <br />I’m gonna have to kill the man I said to myself <br />stick a sharpened spoon into his eye <br />cause I knew I couldn’t win in a fair fight <br />but the Lord must have heard <br />my pleas because two days later <br />Duke Durando was transferred <br />to some other hell hole <br />near Laredo.”<br /><br />Charles Chaim Wax<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/bright-as-the-sun-and-moon/
