Prison humor is a part of life for Callie Smalls

It wasn't always that way. Callie began learning about prison humor, as well as about humor in general, when the Smalls family began writing to prison pen pals as a group project. It was not simply birds of a feather flocking together. Callie has not done any hard time, and neither has any member of her immediate family.

Second cousins don't count.

She does know what inspired the first letter. A local TV station had run a feature about the number of young women being imprisoned in recent years. Some of these girls had been locked up from the age of seventeen or even younger.

They finished growing up in prison. Some were serving extremely long sentences, but even those who got out...usually didn't stay out for long. How could they? They had no, or at best very few, coping skills relevant to the outside world. Family had abandoned them. Their only friends were inside.

When Callie saw that program, she knew she had to help these women.

Over time, it has become a Smalls family tradition: Callie and her husband, Robert, each write three pen pals every week. Each of their five children, all grown now, writes at least one inmate regularly.

When I spoke with Callie about her poetry, which is all about prison humor, I admitted not being sure where to put it. In the end, I placed it here in the Education section--and it is DEFINITELY educational. If the section grows over time, it may get reorganized under a new Prison Humor menu button.

For now, here is Callie's contribution.

(Feel like your web host has you in prison? Click on The Rock for early release!)

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A young lady from south Alabammer
Had a friend 'cross the line in the slammer
She sent her some money
Staff thought it was funny
Not the money order; just her bad grammar

------And, where would we be without inmates who can write?------
The following poem was written and sent to me by a prison pen pal who wishes to remain anonymous.

The Prison Feast
by Anonymous

Have you heard about the feast
Ex-cons on parole and probabtion were busted
Because of their ability
Since there was so much talent
They put their heads together in time
To whip up a meal that was the real deal
The guards were jealous, it was so sublime

We had Stone Soup from the Gray Rock Hotel
Served as the very first course
By a former Spanish chef who was very nice
Kept it all on ice
And called it Granite Gazpacho of course
For meat we had the finest beef
Smuggled right through the front gate
The guards thought that steer
Was a new con here
By the time they figured it out, we'd already ate

Oh, I could go on for an hour or two
Describing every wonderful dish
Not once did any of us have to eat crow
And we got most every wish
But I will admit we had to quit
Stuffed to the very gills
When Iron Mike offered to get us some ears
It made a hundred and ten of us ill

But that was not the worst, no, we were utterly cursed
By the cakes they brought in for dessert
Martha Stewart had put them together
And that's a good thing we were assured
But with apologies to Martha, we had to leave them on the shelves
Too much sugar--hey, we might be cons
But we got to take care of ourselves

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Publisher's note: Poetic-humor.com is more than open to receiving additonal prison humor contributions. Feel free to click on Publish Your Humor and drop us a line.

Thanks for reading,

Fred

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