Prison vs. Pokey

Prisonnoun

A place or institution of confinement, especially of long-term confinement for those convicted of serious crimes or otherwise considered undesirable by the government.

‘The cold stone walls of the prison had stood for over a century.’;

Pokeyadjective

of small volume, cramped

Prisonnoun

(uncountable) Confinement in prison.

‘Prison was a harrowing experience for him.’;

Pokeyadjective

(slang) slow

Prisonnoun

(colloquial) Any restrictive environment, such as a harsh academy or home.

‘The academy was a prison for many of its students because of its strict teachers.’;

Pokeyadjective

fast

Prisonverb

(transitive) To imprison.

Pokeynoun

prison.

Prisonnoun

A place where persons are confined, or restrained of personal liberty; hence, a place or state o confinement, restraint, or safe custody.

‘Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name.’; ‘The tyrant Æolus, . . . With power imperial, curbs the struggling winds,And sounding tempests in dark prisons binds.’;

Pokeynoun

 knife.

Prisonnoun

Specifically, a building for the safe custody or confinement of criminals and others committed by lawful authority.

Pokeyadjective

See Poky.

Prisonverb

To imprison; to shut up in, or as in, a prison; to confine; to restrain from liberty.

‘The prisoned eagle dies for rage.’; ‘His true respect will prison false desire.’;

Pokeynoun

a slang term for jail

Prisonverb

To bind (together); to enchain.

‘Sir William Crispyn with the duke was ledTogether prisoned.’;

Pokeyadjective

wasting time

Prisonnoun

a correctional institution where persons are confined while on trial or for punishment

Pokeyadjective

small and remote and insignificant;

‘a jerkwater college’; ‘passed a series of poky little one-horse towns’;

Prisonnoun

a prisonlike situation; a place of seeming confinement

Prison

A prison, also known as a jail or gaol (dated, British, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correctional facility, lock-up or remand center is a facility in which inmates (or prisoners) are confined and denied a variety of freedoms under the authority of the state as punishment for various crimes. Prisons are most commonly used within a criminal justice system: people charged with crimes may be imprisoned until their trial; those pleading or being found guilty of crimes at trial may be sentenced to a specified period of imprisonment.