Talib Williams

Annotated Tears Talib Williams

The following is a collection of poems, the majority of which were written in California State Prison New Folsom's Creative writing class. This class provided an open environment where freedom of expression was encouraged. Our teachers (Spoon Jackson and Judith Tanenbaum) pushed us to challenge ourselves, to bring out the raw emotion of our hurt and pain...even if this expression was hard for some to swallow...for me, having been in prison at the time, for going on ten years, the hurt and pain was at an all time high...not only from losing loved ones while in prison, which is a hurt that can barely be described (not being able to attend funerals or comfort ones relatives) also the frustrations of being Muslim in California's State Prison system post 9/11... Muslims in California's Prison system are routinely harassed by ignorant correctional officers who are influenced, by right-wing media coverage of Muslims, to believe that all Muslims are extremists and are part of some sleeper cell, as if we have some type of secret alliance with Osama bin Laden (before he was killed) or Abu Bakr al Baghdadi (the leader of ISIS).