Poems from Guantanamo Read online

  audience. Pinioned impossibly in the context of a global war on terror, they seem to realize that a vocabulary of Islamic militancy is poor currency for such ends, even if it were available to given detainees. Instead, the poets strive for a language that is more likely to win advantage: the discourse of universal human

  rights. This is the claret most likely to linger in the chambers of the world’s justice systems, especially those in Western

  countries. Indeed, as Slyomovics has argued, human rights

  discourses are entering the repertoires of a growing number

  of transnational Islamist organizations, especially when their

  members are incarcerated.⁵ At Guantánamo, detainees are pre-

  paring their arguments not in sophisticated legal terminology,

  which most of them lack knowledge of, but rather in the famil-

  iar idioms and vocabulary of their youth. Whether describing

  scenes of nurturing parents or destitute children, of valiant sib-F O R M S O F S U F F E R I N G

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  lings bound by fate or worldwide victory for the oppressed, the idioms most apt for the detainees are those drawn from populist discourses of Arab national liberation.

  If the poems surprise us by their return to a political vocabu-

  ​Poems​from​Guantánamo

  lary of the past, they also remind us of the enduring power in

  crosscultural responses to global inequality. The ultimate re-

  ception of the detainees’ verse is likely to be as varied as the aims of the poets, rendered in as many strains as an anthem

  can have. However construed, the poets strike a deep chord with many audiences, reminding them of the stunted nature of

  justice at Guantánamo. At the very least, their verse has given voice to a new Muslim responsiveness to the United States’ assertion of global legal sovereignty.

  NotES

  1. Montasir al-Zayyat, The Road to al-Qaeda: The Story of Bin Lāden’s Right-Hand Man (Sterling, Virginia: Pluto Press, 2004), p. 31.

  2. Sayyid Qutb, Muhammat al-Sha` ir fi al-Hayah wa Shi` r al-Jil al-Hadir (Cairo: Dar al-Shuruq, 1933 [1974]), pp. 18–19.

  3. Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has stated that the Guantánamo detainees are “among the most dangerous, best-trained, vicious killers on the face of the earth.” The validity of such a claim is questioned by the Pentagon’s own personnel at the base, some of whom have estimated that, at best, only a few dozen of the five hundred detainees have any connection with terrorism (Joseph Margulies, Guantánamo and the Abuse of Presidential Power, New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006), p. 211.

  4. Susan Slyomovics, The Performance of Human Rights in Morocco (Phila-delphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), pp. 10–11.

  5. Ibid., pp. 191–92.

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  f o r m s ​ o f ​ s u f f e r i n G

  POEMS FROM GUANTÁNAMO

  SHAKER ABDURRAHEEM AAMER

  Shaker Abdurraheem Aamer is a Saudi Arabian citizen and

  British resident who has been detained at Guantánamo Bay

  since early 2002. The U.S. military alleges that he has ties to al Qaeda, apparently because of his work in Afghanistan for

  a Saudi charity—the Al-Haramain Foundation—suspected of

  funneling money to terrorist organizations. A leader among

  the Guantánamo detainees, Aamer helped broker an end to

  one of the hunger strikes. He elicited a concession from the military that it would allow the detainees to form a grievance committee and treat them in a manner consistent with the

  Geneva Conventions. In September, 2005, just days after the

  grievance committee was formed, the military disbanded it

  and sent Aamer to solitary confinement, where he remains

  today.

  19

  THEY FIGHT FOR PEACE

  Peace, they say.

  Peace of mind?

  Peace on earth?

  Peace of what kind?

  I see them talking, arguing, fighting—

  What kind of peace are they looking for?

  Why do they kill? What are they planning?

  Is it just talk? Why do they argue?

  Is it so simple to kill? Is this their plan?

  Yes, of course!

  They talk, they argue, they kill—

  They fight for peace.

  20

  S H A K E R A B D U R R A H E E M A A M E R

  ABDULAZIZ

  Abdulaziz, who wishes not to reveal his last name, had just

  graduated from university in his native Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, when U.S. forces launched their attack on Afghanistan. He

  traveled to the region to find his brother and bring him home safely. Soon after Abdulaziz found him, both men were picked up by Northern Alliance forces. After being tortured in an

  Afghan prison, he was turned over to the U.S. military in

  early 2002 and eventually sent to Guantánamo along with

  his brother. Both were classified as enemy combatants. His

  brother was subsequently released, but Abdulaziz remains in

  detention.

  21

  O PRISON DARKNESS

  O prison darkness, pitch your tent.

  We love the darkness.

  For after the dark hours of the night,

  Pride’s dawn will rise.

  Let the world, with all its bliss, fade away—

  So long as we find favor with God.

  A boy may despair in the face of a problem,

  But we know God has a design.

  Even though the bands tighten and seem unbreakable,

  They will shatter.

  Those who persist will attain their goal;

  Those who keep knocking shall gain entry.

  O crisis, intensify!

  The morning is about to break forth.

  22

  A B D U L A Z I Z

  I SHALL NOT COMPLAIN

  I shall not complain to anyone or expect grace from anyone

  other than God, so help me God.

  O Lord, my heart is plagued with troubles.

  I shall not complain to anyone other than You, even if the seas complain of dryness.

  My spirit is free in the heavens, while my body is overpowered

  by chains.

  Praise God, who has granted me patience in times of adversity

  and gratitude in times of gladness.

  Praise God, who placed a garden and an orchard in my bosom,

  so they will be with me always.

  Praise God, who has granted me faith and made me a Muslim.

  Praise God, Lord of the world.

  A B D U L A Z I Z

  23

  ABDULLAH THANI FARIS AL ANAZI

  Abdullah Thani Faris al Anazi is a double amputee,

  having lost both of his legs in a U.S. bombing campaign

  in Afghanistan while he was employed as a humanitarian

  aid worker. After his first leg was amputated, he was arrested on his recovery bed by bounty hunters and turned over to U.S.

  forces. While in U.S. custody, his second leg was amputated.

  He has been held at Guantánamo since 2002, where he has

  received inadequate medical care. At times, he has been

  forced to walk on prosthetic limbs held together with duct

  tape.

  24

  TO MY FATHER

  Two years have passed in far-away prisons,

  Two years my eyes untouched by kohl.

  Two years my heart sending out messages

  To the homes where my family dwells,

  Where lavender cotton sprouts

  For grazing herds that leave well fed.

  O Flaij, explain to those who visit our home

  How I used to live.

  I know your thoughts are swirled as in a whirlwind,

  When you hear the voice of my angu
ished soul.

  Send sweet peace and greetings to Bu’mair;

  Kiss him on his forehead, for he is my father.

  Fate has divided us, like the parting of a parent from a

  newborn.

  O Father, this is a prison of injustice.

  Its iniquity makes the mountains weep.

  I have committed no crime and am guilty of no offense.

  Curved claws have I,

  But I have been sold like a fattened sheep.

  I have no fellows but the Truth.

  They told me to confess, but I am guiltless;

  My deeds are all honorable and need no apology.

  They tempted me to turn away from the lofty summit of

  integrity,

  To exchange this cage for a pleasant life.

  By God, if they were to bind my body in chains,

  If all Arabs were to sell their faith, I would not sell mine.

  A B D U L L A H T H A N I F A R I S A L A N A Z I

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  I have composed these lines

  For the day when your children have grown old.

  O God—who governs creation with providence,

  Who is one, singular and self-subsisting,

  Who brings comfort and happy tidings,

  Whom we worship—

  Grant serenity to a heart that beats with oppression,

  And release this prisoner from the tight bonds of

  confinement.

  26

  A B D U L L A H T H A N I F A R I S A L A N A Z I

  USTAD BADRUZZAMAN BADR

  Ustad Badruzzaman Badr is a prolific Pakistani essayist

  with an MA in English. Along with his brother Shaikh

  Abdurraheem Muslim Dost, he spent much of the 1980s

  publishing magazines that supported rebel fighters against

  the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and writing for the cause of Pashtun nationalism. In November 2001 the brothers were

  arrested by Pakistani intelligence officers, who subsequently turned them over to the U.S. military. Badr was returned

  to Peshawar in 2004 after the military determined that he

  represented no threat to the United States. With his brother, he recently published a memoir of his time in detention,

  The Broken Shackles of Guantánamo.

  27

  LIONS IN THE CAGE

  In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Most Merciful,

  a poem written in Camp Delta, Guantánamo, Cuba

  We are the heroes of the time.

  We are the proud youth.

  We are the hairy lions.

  We live in the stories now.

  We live in the epics.

  We live in the public’s heart.

  We are the shield before the oppressor.

  Our courage is like a mountain.

  The Pharaoh of our time is restless because of us.

  The Chief of the White Palace,

  Like other sinful chiefs,

  Cannot see our patience.

  The whirlpool of our tears

  Is moving fast towards him.

  No one can endure the power of this flood.

  It mostly happens, in these cages,

  That the stars at midnight

  Bring good news—

  That we will surely succeed,

  And the world will wait for us,

  The Caravan of Badr.

  28

  U S T A D B A D R U Z Z A M A N B A D R

  MOAZZAM BEGG

  Moazzam Begg is a British citizen who was arrested in

  Pakistan and detained for three years in Guantánamo. While

  there, Begg received a heavily-censored letter from his seven-year-old daughter; the only legible line was, “I love you, Dad.”

  Upon his release, his daughter told him the censored lines

  were a poem she had copied for him: “One, two, three, four,

  five, / Once I caught a fish alive. / Six, seven, eight, nine, ten, / Then I let it go again.” Released in 2005, he was never charged with a crime. The biggest problem at Guantánamo,

  he explained to Amnesty International, is “the sheer lack of any ability to prove your innocence because you remain in

  limbo, in legal limbo, and have no meaningful communication

  with your family.” Begg recently published a memoir, Enemy

  Combatant: My Imprisonment at Guantánamo, Bagram, and

  Kandahar.

  29

  HOMEWARD BOUND

  Begins this journey without reins,

  Ends in capture without aims;

  Now lying in the cell awake,

  With merriment and smiles all fake:

  Freedom is spent, time is up—

  Tears have rent my sorrow’s cup;

  Home is cage, and cage is steel,

  Thus manifest reality’s unreal

  Dreams are shattered, hopes are battered,

  Yet with new status one is flattered!

  The irony of it—detention, and all:

  Be so small, and stand so tall.

  Years of tears and days of toil

  Are now but fears and tyrants’ spoil;

  Ordainment has surely come to pass,

  But endure alone one must this farce.

  Now “patience is of virtue” taught,

  And virtue is of iron wrought;

  So poetry is in motion set

  (Perhaps, with appreciation met).

  Still the paper do I pen,

  Knowing what, but never when—

  As dreams begin, and nightmares end—

  I’m homeward bound to beloved tend.

  30

  M O A Z Z A M B E G G

  JUMAH AL DOSSARI

  Jumah al Dossari, a thirty-three-year-old Bahraini national, is the father of a young daughter. He has been held at

  Guantánamo Bay for more than five years. In addition to

  being detained without charge or trial, Dossari has been

  subjected to a range of physical and psychological abuses,

  some of which are detailed in Inside the Wire, an account of the Guantánamo prison by former military intelligence soldier Erik Saar. He has been held in solitary confinement since the end of 2003 and, according to the U.S. military, has tried to kill himself twelve times while in the prison. On one occasion, he was found by his lawyer, hanging by his neck and bleeding from a gash to his arm.

  31

  DEATH POEM

  Take my blood.

  Take my death shroud and

  The remnants of my body.

  Take photographs of my corpse at the grave, lonely.

  Send them to the world,

  To the judges and

  To the people of conscience,

  Send them to the principled men and the fair-minded.

  And let them bear the guilty burden, before the world,

  Of this innocent soul.

  Let them bear the burden, before their children and before

  history,

  Of this wasted, sinless soul,

  Of this soul which has suffered at the hands of the “protectors of peace.”

  32

  J U M A H A L D O S S A R I

  SHAIKH ABDURRAHEEM MUSLIM DOST

  Shaikh Abdurraheem Muslim Dost is a Pakistani poet and

  essayist who spent nearly three years in Guantánamo with

  his brother, Ustad Badruzzaman Badr. Dost was a respected

  religious scholar, poet, and journalist—and author of

  nearly twenty books—before his arrest in 2001. While at

  Guantánamo, he composed thousands of lines of poetry in

  Pashto, most of which were retained by the U.S. military after his release in April 2005. In October 2006, shortly after Dost and his brother published a memoir of their Guantánamo

  detention, Dost was again arrested by Pakistani intelligence.

  He has not been heard from since.

  33


  THEY CANNOT HELP

  In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Most Merciful,

  a poem written in Camp Delta, Guantánamo, Cuba

  Those who are charitable

  Cannot help but sacrifice for others.

  They cannot help but face danger

  If they wish to remain true.

  When they face injustice, dishonesty, and iniquity,

  They cannot help but be under the power of the traitors and

  the notorious.

  Consider what might compel a man

  To kill himself, or another.

  Does oppression not demand

  Some reaction against the oppressor?

  It is natural that a man is driven to invention

  And to creation in times of duress.

  The evildoer will be punished.

  He cannot avoid making amends, and must apologize

  eventually.

  Those who foolishly dispute with Dost the Poet

  Cannot help but surrender, or else run away.

  34

  S H A I K H A B D U R R A H E E M M U S L I M D O S T

  CUP POEM 1

  What kind of spring is this,

  Where there are no flowers and

  The air is filled with a miserable smell?

  CUP POEM 2

  Handcuffs befit brave young men,

  Bangles are for spinsters or pretty young ladies.

  S H A I K H A B D U R R A H E E M M U S L I M D O S T

  35

  TWO FRAGMENTS

  1.

  Eid has come, but my father has not.

  He is not come from Cuba.

  I am eating the bread of Eid with my tears.

  I have nothing.

  Why am I deprived of the love of my father?

  Why am I so oppressed?

  2.

  Just as the heart beats in the darkness of the body,

  So I, despite this cage, continue to beat with life.

  Those who have no courage or honor consider themselves free,

  But they are slaves.

  I am flying on the wings of thought,

  And so, even in this cage, I know a greater freedom.

  36

  S H A I K H A B D U R R A H E E M M U S L I M D O S T

  MOHAMMED EL GHARANI

  Mohammed el Gharani, a fourteen-year-old Chadian

  national raised in Saudi Arabia, had recently arrived in

  Pakistan to learn English and to study information technology when he was imprisoned by Pakistani police. They hanged