OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND

By Carlos King

 OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND

(The Incarcerated Men Forgotten by Society)

By: Damani (Carlos King)

It appears we run, when we should stand and fight; We lose hope when our faith should be impenetrable; and we give up on others when we should utilize every resource at our disposal to help them. I realized that very early on in my incarceration that I would lose people, but I never thought I would lose the people I loved the most. Losing certain family members as an eighteen year old kid facing a lengthy prison sentence devastated me. I literally couldn't believe they that would give up on me during one of the worst times in my life.
My family were so essential and massive in my development before coming to prison, that I can't remember a time when I wasn't with them. As they turned their backs on me, I found myself slipping to a darkness I never thought I would emerge from. It was as if I pulled out a mental pen and jot down every person I hated since coming to prison, and most of them were family members. After they left so easily, I had very low expectations for other so called friends I grew up with. I thought, I'll never let anyone else hurt me like I've been hurt by my family.

Losing those family members and friends made me very bitter early on in my incarceration. I felt so betrayed that I didn't care if the entire world fell on top of them and crushed everything they held dear. I fell into a state of unconscious depression due to the severity of my pain. I say unconscious because in my mind I was functioning properly. But in reality, I was very despondent due to them walking away from me. It truly hurt what I was feeling, but I concealed those emotions because I still had to make it through prison.

My state of mind early in my confinement was negative and repressive, I was a slab of stone due to that abandonment and I acted out those feelings in destructive ways. Fighting, catching tickets, and going to segregation relieved me in some distorted way. I didn't have the words to describe my emotions, so I resorted to what I knew best, violence. But as years started flying by, I came to see how what I was doing was more destructive to me.

I lacked the ability to trust and let people get close to me; I lacked the desire to forgive even when some of my family members started reaching in to help me; and lastly, I lacked the concept of self improvement because I was caught up in my own prison made hell. And based on stories I shared with the incarcerated men I was surrounded by, I sought to understand the abandonment we felt on a daily basis. It appeared that when we were giving prison numbers, our humanity was then extracted from us. That removal made it easier for our families and society to abandon us.

We are oftentimes demonized by our bad decisions, despite some of us being innocent or first time offenders. But why does our bad decisions dictate the level of humanity we are worthy of? When the pain, loneliness, and despair we experience everyday is debilitating and soul wrenching enough, why not help us? Prison already takes everything away from us, our family, friends, freedom and our dignity. We are paralyzed in our regrets and at times we cannot move past those transgressions. Without support from the outside world, a great number of us remain stagnant, unable to grow and pursue love, remorse and forgiveness. The darkness of abandonment is sometimes so great, that some of us seek permanent means to rid ourselves of it's torment.

But on the same token, so many of us have atoned and became better men despite our current circumstances and the fact that we were left for dead. We have enriched ourselves in accountability, remorse, information, and accomplishments in our pursuit to be more than the worst things we've ever done like the attorney Bryan Stevenson once said. He also said that the incarcerated is worthy of mercy and forgiveness. And in that spirit, let us come to understand that regardless of our actions and placement, we are still worthy of forgiveness, humanity, love, and second chances.

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