Folsom Prison
Represa, California
September 5, 1965
Dear ...,
For two charged days and restless nights after you left, I loafed in the case of my skull, feeling prematurely embalmed in some magical ethered mist dispensed by the dialectic of our contact. When I left you sitting in that little glass cage, which I must somehow learn to respect because it has a special, eternal meaning now, I did not stop or pause. Including the door to that glass cage, and counting the door of my cell, I passed through twelve assorted gates and doors before collapsing on my narrow bed, staggering under the weight of the DAY…
On the third day, I arose again from the damned. No, that’s going too far!
What a transfusion! I don’t believe I can stand you in such massive doses. It may prove lethal.
I am almost afraid to return to my manuscripts–which themselves seem to cringe from me–after talking with you. I know I shall remain immobile, transfixed, until I’ve gotten this letter off to you. Then…
I really have no sense of myself and I have always suffered under the compliments of others, especially my friends. I panic. I ran for an office in the Folsom Gavel Club recently. One of my boosters poured lavish praise upon me and my qualifications for the job. I squirmed in my seat and felt oppressed. Does this mean that I do not have the ego for a compliment? No, it does not. It’s hypocritical of me, but whenever someone says something nice about me, it sort of knocks me for a loop. And you? The things you said sent me spinning. But don’t stop, let me suffer–and overcome.
I feel impelled to express myself to you extravagantly, and words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs leap in my mind. But I beat them down, refuse to write them, because it all seems so predictable and trite. I feel humiliated by the words you inspire me to write to you. I refuse to write them. What right have you to summon my soul from its slumber? But it’s all golden and I write this from a sense of the sweetness of irony, the better to marvel at the unbelievable sequence of chance events which brought us face to face is a little glass cage in the office of the Warden of Folsom Prison.
You have tossed me a lifeline. If you only knew how I’d been drowning, how I’d considered that I’d gone down for the third time long ago, how I kept thrashing around in the water simply because I still felt the impulse to fight back and the tug of a distant shore, how I sat in a rage that night with the polysyllabic burden of your name pounding in my brain–... ..., ... ...–and out of what instinct did I decide to write to you? It was a gamble on an equation constructed in delirium, and it was right.
Let me put it this way. I was 22 when I came to prison and of course I have changed tremendously over the years. But I had always had a strong sense of myself and in the last few years, I felt I was losing my identity. There was a deadness in my body that eluded me, as though I could not exactly locate its site. I would be aware of this numbness, this feeling of atrophy, and it haunted the back of my mind. Because of this numb spot, I felt peculiarly off balance, the awareness of something missing, of a blank spot, a certain intimation of emptiness. Now I know what it was. and since encountering you, I feel life strength flowing back into that spot. My step, the tread of my stride, which was becoming tentative and uncertain, has begun to recover and take on a new definiteness, a confidence, a boldness which makes me want to kick over a few tables. I may even swagger a little, and, as I read in a book somewhere, “push myself forward like a train.”
NOW TURN THE RECORD OVER AND PLAY THE OTHER SIDE
I have tried to mislead you. I am not humble at all. I have no humility and I do not fear you in the least. If I pretend to be shy, if I appear to hesitate, it is only a sham to deceive. By playing the humble part, I sucker my fellow men in and seduce them of their trust. And then, if it suits my advantage, I lower the boom–mercilessly. I lied when I stated that I had no sense of myself. I am very well aware of my style. My vanity is as vast as the scope of a dream, my heart is that of a tyrant, my arm is the arm of the Executioner. It is only the failure of my plots that I fear. Whereas in the past we have had Prophets of Doom, in my vanity I wish to be the Voice of Doom itself. I am angry at the insurgents of Watts. They have pulled the covers off me and revealed to all what potential may lie behind my Tom Smile. I had planned to run for President of the United States. My slogan?
PUT A BLACK FINGER ON THE NUCLEAR TRIGGER.
400 years of docility, of being calm, cool and collected under stress and strain would go to prove that I was the man for the job, that I would not panic in a crisis and push the button. I could be counted on to be cool. It was a cinch, I had it made–but then came Watts! All my plans went up in smoke! And so, with worn-out tools, I stoop to begin again.
Please take care of yourself.
Until something happens, I shall remain, because I have no other choice–and even if I had another choice I would still remain–
Most Emphatically Yours,
...
