I’ve crossed a line and now they have
my DNA, my shoe size, fingerprints.
In return I get a vegan meal, hot drinks.
Meanwhile, more kids in Gaza starve.

I can do no more today. The acoustics
are to die for between these echoing walls
as my voice swells into Wonderful World.
The deep breathing’s therapeutic,
and sound wells from me in defiance
the way earlier, choirs sang We Will Overcome
and Gaza Will Be Free, as one by one
they lifted, carried us to waiting vans.

I fold a plane from the page titled Women 
in Detention. Its tiny flight cries freedom.

Although an otherwise law-abiding 63-year-old, Rose Lennard has been arrested twice for protesting against the ban on Palestine Action. Her poetry has been published in many print and online journals and anthologies, including Rattle, Mslexia, Stand, Atrium, Magma and Ink, Sweat and Tears.