Editor’s note: This commentary is by Mac Parker, once a popular performer and storyteller in Vermont, who spent four years in Ray Brook FCI in upstate New York. He has recently completed a book about the experiences that led to his incarceration, titled, “How Not to Find God.”
I am a white man, from rural Vermont, who spent four years in federal prison.
While incarcerated, one of my closest friends was a black man from Philadelphia. His name is Andre Coleman, but everyone calls him “Byrd.”
I met Byrd while I was playing first base on a prison softball team. He was the first base umpire. Inning after inning we joked and talked. Both of us nearing 60, he kept wondering if I wasn’t “too old for this.” When I scooped a low throw out of the dirt, he howled with appreciation and called the runner out, whether he was or not.
We’ve been like brothers ever since.
In prison, where black/white friendships aren’t the norm, our connection seemed normal to us.
We walked the track together, learning about each other’s lives. In the dining hall, he’d pat my shoulder as he walked past my seat in the “white section.” In a place not known for caring, Byrd always let me know he was glad to see me.
When his son was arrested back in Philadelphia, Byrd was as heartbroken as I ever saw him. We walked the track until the “Recall Move,” and I got to care about him in return.
In winter, when it was too cold for “old gangsters” to walk outside, we’d sit in the prison library on Saturday afternoons. Our conversations ranged from raucous laughter to sharing things we’d never told another human.
And Byrd wasn’t just my friend. He seemed like everyone’s friend, often bringing “a bowl” of hot food to his homeys on birthdays or hard days. He mentored young inmates, and made sure new arrivals had shower shoes and a coffee mug. When we walked the track, he had a warm greeting for nearly every man we passed.
As my release date approached, he was genuinely happy for me. No hint of the bitterness some inmates can show toward “short-timers.”
He only said, “Man, Parker, I’m gonna miss you.”
On the day of my release, he met me outside Saranac Unit, so we could have breakfast together. He invited me to sit at the Philadelphia table in the “black section,” but no one bothered us. I was with Byrd, which was good enough for them.
When we said goodbye, we hugged longer than inmates are supposed to, and cried openly in a place where men don’t cry in front of others.
We both knew it might be the last time we’d see each other. We promised to stay in touch. And we have.
In the past few weeks, I’ve heard many reminders to “speak George Floyd’s name out loud.” To never forget that this was a man whose life was devalued, whose life was taken from him.
I want to do the same for Byrd.
For Andre Coleman.
Ironically, in prison, black men are less likely to die by violence than they are on the street. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a different kind of knee on their neck. A heartless authority that doesn’t care whether they ever get up.
Andre Coleman, I care. Byrd, I am speaking your name out loud. It’s been almost three years since I saw your face, and I do not forget.
Recently, I sent Byrd an email on Corr-links. I knew the prison was on lockdown because of the pandemic, and I asked how he was.
Days later, he wrote back. He said many inmates and guards had been sick, and they were only allowed out of their cells for an hour a day.
He told me he’d applied for “Compassionate Release,” because of health conditions, but “of course the Warden shot me down.”
I’ve watched Byrd stay upbeat through times that would buckle most men, and, sure enough, he still was.
“But don’t worry, Parker, I’ve applied to the judge. Maybe he’ll give it to me.”
He asked if I’d write a letter to Judge R. Barclay Surrick of the Eastern District Court of Pennsylvania, saying what kind of man I think Byrd is.
So, here I am, Your Honor. I am here to say that whatever Andre Coleman has done in the past, he is a good man, a caring man, a changed man. He may be the warmest, most generous man I’ve ever known, in prison or out. And while of course you cannot know him as I have, you do have the power to bring him home to this city he loves.
You, sir, have the power to not only let him up, but to lift him up.
This is a time when we are all being called to open our eyes and open our hearts.
Please, if you see fit, open the door for my friend, Andre Coleman.
