"My coffee cup has, on its rim, tiny marks from frantic gnawing. Not mine but those of a guest. A mouse. Several years ago when Building I (well, not the building but the people in the building) moved to Building III, my roommate and I picked up a companion between buildings.

I discovered him in my boot. 'Look,' I said to my roommate, 'A mouse.'

Now my roommate is a steady, solid mountain woman. She is not one of those flighty girlie-girls: She's lived on a working farm (killed her breakfast) and when it comes to her beliefs, she's the most fearless and courageous person I've every met. I fully expected her to snatch the mouse from my boot, flush it down the toilet and dare me to speak one word on behalf of the nasty vermin. Instead with the leaping grace of a mountain goat, she sprang, in a single bound, to the top of our mound of belongings.

'Where is it?' she whimpered. 'Disgusting thing. Get it out of here.' She glowered at me. 'I can't stand mice.'

I was so startled I laughed, which made my roommate thunder at me from her unsteady perch--which made me laugh all the harder. So hard I dropped the boot. But when the mouse ran across my naked foot, my laughter stopped.

The little jig I danced, and my roommate, wild-eyed and uncertainly-balanced on top of her wobbly mountain, drew attention from the women in the day room. A wave of panic rippled around the room. 'What is it?' 'Where is it?' 'Get it!'

Women were screaming, leaping jumping, clinging. In a moment most were on tables and chairs. A couple of us began gingerly to peep under piles of clothes, to shake boots, poke under the washer and dryer with a broom. There were a million possible hiding places in this mouse playground.

We found his nest in the dryer. But I found him in my coffee cup.

'Kill it!' 'Kill it!' clamored the majority but I heard a single plea for its life from a teenager serving a natural life sentence. 'Can't it be released somewhere?'

'In the garbage?' I replied unimaginatively.

'No, no,' she said. 'You have to take it outside.'

'I guess I can ask the officer to put it out the back door.' As I said this I could just imagine pushing the intercom buzzer and making this request.

But again she was shaking her head. 'That won't work either. He'll just come back.' She thought for a moment. 'You have to take him out into the field where he can make a home.'

Astonishingly enough, arrangements were made and Mr. Mouse was released into his field. He has not returned.

Whenever I look at the little teeth marks on my cup, I am reminded of all that was involved in releasing that mouse and I wonder why so little of a prison sentence is geared towards preparing inmates for release. Even captive wild animals that are to be released back into their habitat go through rigorous preparation and training to improve their chances of success. Perhaps if more thought and energy were devoted to prepare inmates for release, fewer would find their way back." (Elizabeth Haysom, Fluvanna Review, April 15, 2004)

Elizabeth Haysom is presently incarcerated at the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women in Troy, Virginia. She is serving a 90 year sentence as an accessory to the murder of her parents in 1985. This column was first printed as part of a series, under the general heading 'Glimpses from Inside.'