ISSUE NO. 21
APRIL 2026

Creative

This section publishes creative contributions mostly from currently and formerly incarcerated people. It includes short-stories, poetry, creative nonfiction, art, and much more.

If you have something creative to submit to us, we would love to read it, or see it, and publish it in About Time – please write to us!

Ethan Cassidy

My Happy Place

The winner from our first Writing Challenge!

By David

There is a place not far from Flinders Street Station, along the bank of the Yarra River, that’s at the centre of everything I love about Melbourne.

ISSUE NO. 21
1 MIN READ
Ethan Cassidy

My Happy Place: Rusty, My Soulmate

The runner-up from our first Writing Challenge!

By Pip

Everyone needs their own happy place. Especially in here. Somewhere to escape the drama and politics of the yard.

ISSUE NO. 21
1 MIN READ
Ethan Cassidy
By Shea

What a joy it can be, to wrench open your mind and find yourself inhabiting a song. To live out a thousand lives, to know the intimacy of a stranger, and experience nostalgia in such a visceral way for times and places you’ve never been to.

ISSUE NO. 21
3 MIN READ
By Nicholas

I hope you all have a place that you can feel your strength from. I wish I had more of these than I do, now he’s gone. Make most of your time people, inside or out – our lives are too short to waste. Find your Happy Place.

ISSUE NO. 21
1 MIN READ
By Trieste

It’s 10am, I am at work deciding if I need coffee to get the jitters, a piece of fruit for some sugary glucose or a peanut butter and jam sandwich.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ
By Neale

Maybe the title for this competition should be OUR Happy Place rather than MY Happy Place. As I think it is more about how we approach a place together that determines if we are going to be happy or not.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ
By James

My experience of entering gaol was hazy and blurry. A brick, as they say, is a 10 year term of imprisonment, and getting outta my mind was on my list of things to do, not realising that I would find my true happy place in nature.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ
By Jonathan

Within that club of egos, I had found a friend. He talked to me of glory and made me want to join. So I sent a few gold coins and received a nonsense letter. I must be a member! In a group of names, I am the unclean one, the token unpublished poet; there always must be one.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ
By Anonymous

The straps of his back-pack chaffed and pulled against his shoulders, the weight of each uneven step threatening to topple him back down the slope. His boots crunched the tiny pebbles that slided and slid, plumes of dust flicking into the still air.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ
By Russell

Two words, one name. I was stunned. Gathering my thoughts, I started the mental checklist. Had I pressed the wrong button? No. Was it a stranger answering? No. It was definitely my son, a changed son.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ

Latest

Art From Inside

By Lanie

Our team was blown away by this beautiful painting.

ISSUE NO. 21
1 MIN READ
Lanie

You Don’t Know Your Worth

By Flame

Don't fear my love, everything’s alright. Don't fear my friends, the future looks bright.

ISSUE NO. 21
2 MIN READ
By Caleb

Love’s definition cannot be just one, not one, two or more but a tonne. Love is the greatest quality of them all, a verse written by the poet Paul.

ISSUE NO. 21
1 MIN READ
By Emma-lee

I sit here watching the second-hand ticking by as it slowly keeps passing my time... And just as I thought the world can’t be changed it's an apocalypse of the mind.

ISSUE NO. 21
1 MIN READ

Previous Editions

ISSUE NO. 19
February 2026

Trapped Away

By CJ

I’ve done almost 10 years in prison and I’m totally done with it now and can’t wait to be out away from this place.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 18
January 2026

Hope

By Elijah

From good to bad, and up to down, life twisted us around, now here we stand.

1 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 18
January 2026

Emotions, Love and Hate

By A

Love's last pain; It is everything. It is nothing. It is unbearable.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 18
January 2026

Beautiful Souls

By RM

Why should you suffer for my pain. Knowledge in this I should try to gain. Does it feel I have left you alone? It may feel I have cut you to the bone, but please believe me, my love is true, I know in the past I didn’t know what to do.

1 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 18
January 2026

Poems by Denis

By Denis

Memories arise, an echo's gentle sway, circling 'round me, crays of yesterday. Recalling her smile, so beautiful and bright, a beacon of joy in the softest light.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 18
January 2026

Won’t Quit

By Zoe

My name is Zoe. I am 37 years old and I was in prison for 6 years. I am currently on parole and have been out of prison for a year and a half. Since then I have been a core member of the Formerly Incarcerated Girls Justice Advocates Melbourne (FIGJAM) Collective.

3 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 18
January 2026

All Men Love Freedom!

By Bukks

All men love their freedom, and the freedom they do take. Freedom can be lost, by making many mistakes. Don't take freedom for granted, as they may take it away. Prisons were invented, just to make a young man pay.

2 MIN READ
ISSUE NO. 17
December 2025

My Barbed Wire Syndrome

By Anon-conformous

They expect us to play ball, but always move the goalposts. They expect us to hold boundaries, the same they overstep. They want us to abide, but break their own rules.

1 MIN READ

Welcome to About Time

About Time is the national newspaper for Australian prisons and detention facilities

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