C. D. Wright’s damning thoughts on Louisiana, the prisons held within the state, and the “prison industrial complex” present in the Louisiana are showcased in her poetry collection, entitled One Big Self. Wright’s preface to her poems, “Stripe for Stripe,” is where she tells the reader she passes four prisons on the way to one of her designations (p. xiv). A purpose in her writing is to find out the reason why there are so many prisons. The humid mess that is Louisiana’s countryside is described in poems like “On the Road to St. Gabriel” and “Just Another Day.” In these poems, Wright is setting the scene for the location surrounding three prisons she visited for her work. These are the prisons that feed into the “prison industrial complex”.
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Wright shows that being convicted is a family tradition. By pointing out these issues, Wright hopes to get her readers to see their privilege of being outside of prison and understand that many people make mistakes that could lead them to being incarcerated. She also wants to raise awareness to the fact that the free-worlders benefit from the “prison industrial complex” economically through the state market because if people do not go to prison, their other option is to work with toxic chemicals in Cancer Alley, also talked about in “On the road to St. Gabriel:”. C. D. Wright sees Louisiana as a place that makes the immense amount of prisons and the idea of the “prison industrial complex” possible. For her, the rural location and poverty-stricken people are two characteristics that make for a breeding ground of the unacceptable public works, known as prisons. She wants to get the reader to view the prisoners with sympathetic humanity so they can recognize the flaws in the system while making the reader stop to think about their freedom and privilege as a …show more content…
In “On the Road to St. Gabriel:”, she says “The highest concentration of makers and dumpers of toxic chemicals in the country and seventh on the planet known locally and globally as Cancer Alley” (p. 20). The writer is showing that Louisiana is a dangerous wasteland and is saying that Louisiana is a cancerous place; both literally and figuratively since the number of prisons is so high. She is also saying that calling the state Cancer Alley is commonplace, since that is it’s nickname both nationally and internationally. Wright connects these ideas in “Just Another Day” with the lines “Hotter said the inmate between sets than my thirteen-year-old niece” (p. 58). She is showing, first of all, that the hot weather is an everyday occurrence that looms over the inmates of one of the male prisons but also that it is acceptable for an inmate to talk about his underage niece in an incestual, sexual way. Wright is passing along to the reader the mundane nature of the shocking things that happen in the prison. She is also showing that inmate in the poem is carrying along with these illegal ideas in his head while working out at the iron pile, instead of receiving help for his
Wright shows that being convicted is a family tradition. By pointing out these issues, Wright hopes to get her readers to see their privilege of being outside of prison and understand that many people make mistakes that could lead them to being incarcerated. She also wants to raise awareness to the fact that the free-worlders benefit from the “prison industrial complex” economically through the state market because if people do not go to prison, their other option is to work with toxic chemicals in Cancer Alley, also talked about in “On the road to St. Gabriel:”. C. D. Wright sees Louisiana as a place that makes the immense amount of prisons and the idea of the “prison industrial complex” possible. For her, the rural location and poverty-stricken people are two characteristics that make for a breeding ground of the unacceptable public works, known as prisons. She wants to get the reader to view the prisoners with sympathetic humanity so they can recognize the flaws in the system while making the reader stop to think about their freedom and privilege as a …show more content…
In “On the Road to St. Gabriel:”, she says “The highest concentration of makers and dumpers of toxic chemicals in the country and seventh on the planet known locally and globally as Cancer Alley” (p. 20). The writer is showing that Louisiana is a dangerous wasteland and is saying that Louisiana is a cancerous place; both literally and figuratively since the number of prisons is so high. She is also saying that calling the state Cancer Alley is commonplace, since that is it’s nickname both nationally and internationally. Wright connects these ideas in “Just Another Day” with the lines “Hotter said the inmate between sets than my thirteen-year-old niece” (p. 58). She is showing, first of all, that the hot weather is an everyday occurrence that looms over the inmates of one of the male prisons but also that it is acceptable for an inmate to talk about his underage niece in an incestual, sexual way. Wright is passing along to the reader the mundane nature of the shocking things that happen in the prison. She is also showing that inmate in the poem is carrying along with these illegal ideas in his head while working out at the iron pile, instead of receiving help for his