Never welcomed here:
Once a prison, once an asylum,
once both: no clear distinction
between violence and lunacy.
And then the closing. Windows blinded
and doors shut, sealed off from the
outside world. Sealed in from us.
We are uninvited,
not permitted to peer inside
the chilled and shadowed rooms,
not allowed a whiff of damp
or madness.
We remain unincluded
alone and isolated on the periphery
with our own dark thoughts, wondering.