My Brothers Keeper

“How many times have you been arrested? How many times have you been charged with a crime? How many felony convictions? How many misdemeanors? Contact your lawyer and ask him to send you a copy of your criminal history. Add together the days, months and years you’ve spent behind bars. I’m not speaking for anyone else but this is the amount of time you’ve robbed me of. This is the time that you’ve taken from being my big brother. This is the time you’ve taken from grandma, mom, your siblings, your wife, your kids, your extended family and friends. You have taken YOU away so much, so often that you don’t realize how it affects me. I can’t call you to run ideas or problems by you, can’t meet you for breakfast, couldn’t even invite you to my graduation man. So if I sound like I’m mad or disappointed; fuck yeah! You’ve been leaving me for institutions and jails since we were small kids. Deep down inside I’m not angry. I’m hurt. You left me and you keep leaving me. The greatest crime you commit is when you make the conscious decision to engage in criminal, illegal, immoral, unlawful behavior that results in you being locked away from your family. You keep saying that nobody’s here for you. Motherfucker you ain’t here for us. You left us, we didn’t leave you. We’re still right here! If you were here, living in the freedom that God gave you then maybe you could rush and send yourself that paperwork necessary to get back the freedom that YOU chose to surrender in the first place. I’m your baby brother; always will be and I will always love you but that bull about nobody coming to see you or sending you anything – Save It. You ain’t supposed to go to jail in the first damn place. Unless it’s an emergency, I’m not calling your lawyer or looking your case up online because you shouldn’t even have a case. I know you want to get out but if I was the judge and you couldn’t produce a plan, proposal or at least some idea of what you plan to do if/when you get out; then you ain’t going nowhere. You’re gonna set yourself up to repeat the same mistakes. Push for a release but have a plan upon release. Have some idea of what your life could be or the streets will devise one for you. Grandma gave me some money for graduating. Don’t tell her but I’m sending you half of it. I love you and I miss you.” I came across this letter written by a first generation college graduate while I was doing research for ‘The P Code’ (an original stage play). While everyone else was celebrating, he was writing.