Two poems run through this Occupy W.C. project: Death Poem and The Black Arrow / The Darkness of Prison. They were written by prisoners detained and tortured at Guantánamo, in the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay Naval Base in southeastern Cuba.
Their words transform imprisonment into testimony, memory and a poetic act. From this emerges a dialogue with I Am Time: a reflection on poetry’s ability to endure beyond violence and oblivion.
Death poem
Death Poem
Take my blood.
Take my shroud
and the remnants of my body.Photograph my corpse
alone in the grave.Send the photographs to the world,
to the judges and to those
with a clear conscience.
Send them to principled and fair-minded people.And let them bear the burden of guilt,
before the world,
for this innocent soul.Let them bear the burden,
before their children and before history,
for this wasted and pure soul,
for this soul that suffered
at the hands of the “protectors of peace.”
Jumah al Dossari
Jumah al Dossari
A Bahraini national and father of a daughter, Jumah al Dossari was detained at Guantánamo for more than five years without charge or trial.
During his detention he endured severe physical and psychological abuse, also described in Inside the Wire, the account by former U.S. soldier Erik Saar. Held in prolonged solitary confinement, he attempted to take his own life several times.
I Am Time
“I can wait longer than you, because I am Time.”
So writes Salvador González Escalona, the recently deceased Cuban artist, in one of his murals in Callejón de Hamel, Havana. From this sentence, the Occupy W.C. project takes shape: Time becomes poetry, memory and a possibility of resistance.
Poetry takes form through the voices of three Cuban artists — Alexander Beatón Galano, Pedro Gutiérrez Torres and José Ramón Sánchez Leyva — invited to share their creative worlds and the Cuba of today.
Alexander Beatón Galano (1968) explores contemporary identity as a space of relationships in constant transformation.
José Ramón Sánchez Leyva (1972) is both a rational and instinctive poet, guided by the sound of words and by their historical, social and political meaning.
Born in Guantánamo, the artists confront a reality shaped by the presence of the U.S. military base. Their work opens a broader reflection on communication, coexistence and the possibility of imagining the future.
Marcello Simeone
Performance I Am Time — June 2022
Locations
Paris — Palais de Tokyo
London — Tate Modern
Madrid — Museo del Prado, Museo Reina Sofía, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza
Venice — Biennale Arte
With the participation of
Alexander Beatón Galano, Yasnai Ricardo Perez, Anna Pau, Beatrice, Davide Turi, Giovanna Farigu Simeone, José Ramón, Sánchez Guerra, Laila, Leonardo, Luciana Fronteddu, Manuela Mossa, Nicolas Chaveau Pegas, Norma Gomez Triana, Paolo Desogus, Pietro, Seriocha Sarmiento Perez, Simona Campus and Vittorio.
To learn how the Occupy W.C. project works, visit the project page.