Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Dec 2012
They're children
They're just children!
He yelled at the camera
And they're forced into this
Living Hell with no way out!

He tried his best to raise
Whatever awareness could be aroused
It was wrong
These children
They were writhing
In their own
**** and ****
Curled up in little *****
Without an inch of clothing on them

When he came in
The orderlies avoided him
And his camera
They couldn't be held responsible
For the atrocities that were taking place
In the buildings where they secured the little income they had

The nurses shot ***** looks
There were few of them
Only about one was assigned to a room
Which housed around fifty children apiece
When he asked them
Can you spare a moment?
For the camera and the lives of these poor kids?*
They're eyebrows pointed down in a sharp line
And they quickly rushed away

He couldn't believe it
Children
Not older than ten years
Running about
Bare naked
Covered in the foulest of substances
Emanating smells you couldn't imagine
Yelling incoherently
And
Just as the orderlies and nurses did
Running in the opposite direction of the camera
And the reporter
That would expose the place they called "home"
For the snake pit it was
In the 1980s, Geraldo Rivera did an exposé on the Willowbrook State School in Staren Island, New York. This writing is based on the images they captured during their trip to the "snake pit".
John
Written by
John  28/M/New York
(28/M/New York)   
Please log in to view and add comments on poems