ISSUE NO. 27
October 2026
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Creative

This section publishes creative contributions mostly from currently and formerly incarcerated people. It includes short-stories, poetry, creative nonfiction, art, and much more.

If you have something creative to submit to us, we would love to read it, or see it, and publish it in About Time – please write to us!

Latest

By Janali

Cold blows the wind tonight, sweetheart, cold are the drops of rain, cold are the four walls of my cell, so cold I shall remain.

ISSUE NO. 28
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2 MIN READ
By Elijah

These “emotions” that carry me. It’s from these that you see me. Let not what you see, be all I can be. I’m so much more, this isn’t all.

ISSUE NO. 28
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1 MIN READ
By Gema

A girl trying to find her soul, an escape with rope and toe up a tree, a knot a swing.

ISSUE NO. 28
•
2 MIN READ
By Minh

No mail, no bail, just jail. Hail and rain, rain and suffering, silently ingrained.

ISSUE NO. 28
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2 MIN READ
By Emily

Shout out to all you maintenance workers, from painting to plumbing, youse know you’re the reasons these places don’t collapse in on us!

ISSUE NO. 28
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1 MIN READ

Previous Editions

ISSUE NO. 3
September 2024
Love Breaks Chains
By Malnight

Oh how I can’t stand these nights alone, wishing that I could just go home. Never thought this is where I’d be, constantly dreaming of being free.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 3
September 2024
I Cannot Write Poetry
By A

I’ve tried to write poetry, but I find it hard to do, I’d like to say in pretty words, just what I think of you. And what I would like to say, would be something like this: you make my heart run wild, with just one little kiss.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 3
September 2024
Beyond the Bars
By Codey

Beyond the bars, I sit and think about the past. Beyond the bars, I wait and watch the time pass. Beyond the bars, I barely ever see the stars. Beyond the bars, I’m alone in the dark.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 2
August 2024
You Were Never There
Anonymous

You were never there to tuck me into bed. No, you were never there at night when I was scared. Mama, where were you when I needed you most. Mama tell me why all alone I had to cope.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 2
August 2024
Freedom Is Not a Box
By Taylor

Freedom has been likened to a bird, a plane, a song, it has been once personified as a road that’s very long. Freedom has been likened to people: from war, death, or insanity, to others it is being absolved from rules for eternity.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 2
August 2024
Eco-cow
By Kyle

The two men popped open the Tesla's doors, thump thomp, and stepped out into a blooming orchard. The air was a herbal tea. Honey bees bobbed between the peach pink flowers.

3 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 1
July 2024
I'll Never Come to Prison Again
By Joseph B

If I could dress it up and say I never felt better, that I’ve got a girl at home and I’m waiting for a letter. I’d pretend the kids are fine and doing well at school, and when I phone they say they miss me and they think their daddy’s cool.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 1
July 2024
I Am Yours
By Lauren

No matter what our pasts may say, what hurts, our pains endured, and tears shed for those who walked away. You and I, need not let ourselves be defined by those hurts from our pasts and no longer will it influence our time.

3 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 1
July 2024
Waiting for Parole
By Nick

Waiting for parole is like remand all o'er again. When starting on my 'things-to-do', my mind leaps back to 'when!?' All-consuming niggling thoughts contort me out of shape. Swarms of bees inside my head frantic for an escape.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 1
July 2024
The Road to Redemption
By Elisa

Don't follow in my footsteps, it's been no Sunday stroll, no the road to redemption, isn't paved in gold.

3 MIN READ

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