It’s that tantalizing glimpse of freedom that quiets everyone in the room after a few minutes, the image of that small figure in gray sweats vanishing around a corner they will never see. Security will be tighter for a while now, they know, privileges fewer, the more lenient staff less likely now to allow a Domino’s delivery in the night, like in the old days. A writing exercise yields little more than blank papers matched by blank stares from most of the kids. I’m about to call it a night, but then a new student says he has something he wants to read, a poem he shyly offers up to the table for criticism. It’s a surprise, because in two previous classes, this boy hasn’t said a word. Rodrigo Becerra is, at seventeen, bound for a long prison sentence in adult court for attempted murder. He is a classic Juvenile Court career criminal, six arrests over three years—car thefts, high-speed chases, carrying guns in almost all of them, a long-recognized abuse of PCP and other drugs involved in each crime.
What do You think about No Matter How Loud I Shout?
