Two poems run through this Occupy W.C. project: Death Poem and The Black Arrow / O Prison Darkness. 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.
The black arrow
The Black Arrow
In the cells of the Muslim prisoners
at the naval base, there is an arrow
pointing towards Mecca.The base lies at 19° 54′ 42.95″ North
and 75° 09′ 11.75″ West.
Mecca lies at 21° 25′ 01″ North
and 39° 49′ 00″ East.Their prayers must travel 12,793 kilometres
over the Atlantic,
the Sahara and the Red Sea:
a minor geographical impertinence
that will not keep them from Paradise.And if the Americans
had not put up the arrows,
then
what?
José Ramón Sánchez Leyva
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.
Abdulaziz
Abdulaziz
Abdulaziz, who prefers not to reveal his surname, had just graduated from university in his native Riyadh when the U.S. intervention in Afghanistan began. He travelled to the region to find his brother and bring him home.
After being captured by Northern Alliance forces, he was tortured in an Afghan prison, transferred to the U.S. military in 2002 and sent to Guantánamo with his brother. Both were classified as “enemy combatants”; his brother was later released.
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.