Have you ever been arrested
for simply walking home
no crime in your pocket,
just keys… and thoughts… and tomorrow?
I have
The night was quiet,
but their siren spoke louder than my innocence.
“Unafanya nini hapa?
A question dressed like concern,
but loaded like a gun.
And me
with chest full of borrowed courage—
I said,
“I know my rights.
Ah
those four words
they tasted like freedom in my mouth,
but landed like an insult in theirs.
Because suddenly,
the law was no longer a book
It was a book
Slaps translated my confidence,
blows edited my speech,
and before I could finish defending myself,
darkness filed the final report.
Blackout.
I woke up
not to justice
but to walls that smelled like forgotten people,
a floor that had memorized suffering,
and a charge that had never met me:
“Drunk and disorderly.”
Funny
how sobriety becomes guilt
when power needs a reason.
“Pay, or go to court.”
And fear
fear doesn’t wait for evidence.
It doesn’t cross-examine the truth.
Fear signs confessions
written in trembling hands.
So I paid.
Not because I was wrong,
but because survival whispered,
“Live today… argue tomorrow.”
Tell me
Do we really know our rights?
Or do we just recite them
like prayers we hope
Will one day be answered?
Because out here,
the constitution feels like a storybook—
beautifully written,
rarely lived.
The law
They say it is blind.
But I have seen it peek
through fingers of authority,
choosing who to see,
and who to step on.
And justice
justice that night
did not wear a uniform.
It wore anger,
it spoke in fists,
it signed its name in bruises.
So I ask
Are the police always right?
Or are we just too afraid
to prove them wrong?
Because knowing your rights
is one thing
but standing in front of power
while it forgets them
that
That is a different kind of courage.
And maybe one day,
we won’t have to whisper our rights
like secrets in the dark,
or pay for our freedom
with fear as currency.
Maybe one day
walking home
will not feel like a crime.
But until then
we keep asking:
Are these laws truly ours?
Or are they just ink on paper
waiting for justice
to finally learn how to breathe?
