StarshipCapricorn User Forum

Another offering from Poems from Guantanamo.  Keep in mind when you read the dossier of the poet and his poem that every line of this book was approved by the Pentagon prior to publication.  I wonder how the American military guards, attorneys and all involved in perpetrating the moral, legal and spiritual atrocity of Guantanamo and other aspects of the American Gulag are dealing with what they are, what they are doing.  What kind of memories will they have?  Is their denial that deep?  Could they write poetry?  What were the thoughts of the military as they previewed this book for publication? How do they handle that this poet has tried to kill himself 12 times while in prison and was being held in solitary confinement from 2003 until publication in 2007?  How do they handle that he has not been charged with anything?  I know that Rumsfield, Bush, certainly Cheney, Addington, Yoo and other "negative elites" (to use David Wilcock's term) are not troubled, but what about the ordinary Guantanamo guard, attorney and their familes? 

Amethyst   


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 Guntanamo 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 Guantanamo 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.

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."

Last edited by Amethyst (2009-02-25 03:28:11)

What I find striking about both of these poems is first, the extreme of emotions, where the first one dwelt on his love for his child and the other, a desire to be released, even if release is found in death. Both men did not speak of condemnation of their captors but rather they spoke of justice and success to the righteous.

As long as these prisoners do not harbor resentment they will, in time heal of their physical and emotional wounds. The loving nature of the Arab people is far greater than we in the West have been led to believe. I'm not saying that the Arabs do not have in their midsts a few rotten apples, for indeed they do, just as we do.

The old saying goes: "it only takes a few rotten apples to spoil the whole barrel." But, if the rotten apples are removed before they can spoil the whole barrel, then there will still be much good fruit left. So I speak of a barrel of apples but the reality is that of humans. In the analogy, one might throw the thoroughly rotten apples onto the compost heap and simply cut from the not so rotten apples, that part which is spoiled. How this is to work out in the human sense, I do not know... but I'm hopeful that clearer minds will prevail and justice is served in the best interest of all.

There are two choices here, as I see it. The first choice is to stoop to their level and treat them as they have treated others or, rise above all of that and for a change, see where compassion and unconditional love can lead us. Perhaps in the end, all that which is seen as negative will become positive and whatever good that may be found will have a chance to blossom to its fullest.

Last edited by Christo Alado (2009-02-25 17:03:28)

Christo Alado wrote:

What I find striking about both of these poems is first, the extreme of emotions, where the first one dwelt on his love for his child and the other, a desire to be released, even if release is found in death. Both men did not speak of condemnation of their captors but rather they spoke of justice and success to the righteous.

As long as these prisoners do not harbor resentment they will, in time heal of their physical and emotional wounds. The loving nature of the Arab people is far greater than we in the West have been led to believe.

Christo, I agree and I think some of these prisoners can heal.  Some, of course, are so broken they cannot write poetry.  The other thing that comes through is their strong believe in a loving God.  It's also striking how randomly some of them got picked up, turned over to the Americans and shipped to Guantanamo with no sort of investigation, charges or anything.

Here's another poem from a man who was subsequently released in 2005.  He will survive with his religious faith.  This poet was a college kid that spent some time at the University in Virginia and got caught up at the Pakistani border.  He was 24 when the book was published in 2007.  This poem was written sometime before his release in 2005.  I find his wisdom and strength remarkable in one so young.  Although some of the Guantanamo prisoners are teenagers.  One of them had to have been 11 when he supposedly got tagged as the "worst of the worst", to use Cheney's term for Guantanamo.

Amethyst

ABDULLA MAJID AL NAOIMI, THE CAPTIVE OF DIGNITY

Abdulla Majid al Noaimi is a twenty-four year old citizen of Bahrain who attended Old Dominion University in Virginia, but returned home after a year, heartbroken over breaking up with his girlfriend.  Shortly after beginning his electrical engineering studies in the United Arab Emirates in 2001, Noaimi traveled to Afghanistan to find a family member who had not been heard from in some time.  After an unsuccessful search, he made his way to the Pakistani border and asked to be taken to the Bahrain embassy.  Instead, Pakistani authorities turned him over to the U.S. military.  He was detained in Kandahar, Afghanistan, for about five months before being transferred to Guantanamo.  He was released from the prison camp in November 2005.

I WRITE MY HIDDEN LONGING

I write my hidden longing:

I tried to defend him with my eyes,
But I looked around and was cornered.
Destiny had found me.

My rib is broken,
And I can find no one to heal me.

Before me is a tumultuous sea;
The land continues to call me.
But I am sailing in my thoughts.

The impious have murdered me in my home.

I wish someone would comfort me;
At night I taste bile and cannot sleep.

The tears of someone else's longing are affecting me;
My chest cannot take the vastness of emotion.

The book of God consoles me,
And dulls the pains I have suffered.
The book of God assauges my misery,
Even though they declared war against it.

I stand tall and smile in the face of misery,
I am satisfied.

Oh Father, tell the tearful one,
"Do not forget me, as I do not forget you."
He will understand my condition.

And when you pass by life's familiar objects--
The Bedouin rugs, the bound branches,
The flight of pigeons--
Remember me.

I salute the brothers,
And pray peace to those who remain faithful.
I say hello to Shwayman,
And to everyone whom I love,
And to every one who misses me.

Remember, pray to god for those whom I love.
Maybe God, with His kindness, will have mercy on me.

Last edited by Amethyst (2009-02-26 04:34:03)

Amethyst wrote:

Christo Alado wrote:

What I find striking about both of these poems is first, the extreme of emotions, where the first one dwelt on his love for his child and the other, a desire to be released, even if release is found in death. Both men did not speak of condemnation of their captors but rather they spoke of justice and success to the righteous.

As long as these prisoners do not harbor resentment they will, in time heal of their physical and emotional wounds. The loving nature of the Arab people is far greater than we in the West have been led to believe.

Christo, I agree and I think some of these prisoners can heal.  Some, of course, are so broken they cannot write poetry.  The other thing that comes through is their strong believe in a loving God.  It's also striking how randomly some of them got picked up, turned over to the Americans and shipped to Guantanamo with no sort of investigation, charges or anything.

Here's another poem from a man who was subsequently released in 2005.  He will survive with his religious faith.  This poet was a college kid that spent some time at the University in Virginia and got caught up at the Pakistani border.  He was 24 when the book was published in 2007.  This poem was written sometime before his release in 2005.  I find his wisdom and strength remarkable in one so young.  Although some of the Guantanamo prisoners are teenagers.  One of them had to have been 11 when he supposedly got tagged as the "worst of the worst", to use Cheney's term for Guantanamo.

Amethyst

ABDULLA MAJID AL NAOIMI, THE CAPTIVE OF DIGNITY

Abdulla Majid al Noaimi is a twenty-four year old citizen of Bahrain who attended Old Dominion University in Virginia, but returned home after a year, heartbroken over breaking up with his girlfriend.  Shortly after beginning his electrical engineering studies in the United Arab Emirates in 2001, Noaimi traveled to Afghanistan to find a family member who had not been heard from in some time.  After an unsuccessful search, he made his way to the Pakistani border and asked to be taken to the Bahrain embassy.  Instead, Pakistani authorities turned him over to the U.S. military.  He was detained in Kandahar, Afghanistan, for about five months before being transferred to Guantanamo.  He was released from the prison camp in November 2005.

I WRITE MY HIDDEN LONGING

I write my hidden longing:

I tried to defend him with my eyes,
But I looked around and was cornered.
Destiny had found me.

My rib is broken,
And I can find no one to heal me.

Before me is a tumultuous sea;
The land continues to call me.
But I am sailing in my thoughts.

The impious have murdered me in my home.

I wish someone would comfort me;
At night I taste bile and cannot sleep.

The tears of someone else's longing are affecting me;
My chest cannot take the vastness of emotion.

The book of God consoles me,
And dulls the pains I have suffered.
The book of God assauges my misery,
Even though they declared war against it.

I stand tall and smile in the face of misery,
I am satisfied.

Oh Father, tell the tearful one,
"Do not forget me, as I do not forget you."
He will understand my condition.

And when you pass by life's familiar objects--
The Bedouin rugs, the bound branches,
The flight of pigeons--
Remember me.

I salute the brothers,
And pray peace to those who remain faithful.
I say hello to Shwayman,
And to everyone whom I love,
And to every one who misses me.

Remember, pray to god for those whom I love.
Maybe God, with His kindness, will have mercy on me.

Amethyst,

Abdulla's poem falls in the middle of the other two extreme examples of the Gitmo poems, in that Abdulla has found a measure of being able to cope with his situation through his understanding of a loving God. Again, this author does not speak of condemnation of his captors... in fact, he speaks of God's mercy regarding his own plight.

I wonder if the untranslated versions of these poems would show rhymes and pentameters of an even greater artfulness and passion than these translated version can reveal. Things do get lost in translation.

Regards their seemingly random incarceration, my understanding of it is this: the dark is working tirelessly to subdue the light in others. That is the reason why, I feel they were targeted... their light of love had shone just a bit too bright and so they were tagged.

We've seen bright lights extinguished here in this country as well, for instance, John F. Kennedy and Stanley Miers (Myers?) and a whole host of others who only seek to right the wrongs in this world. How to end the misery is a mystery at the moment, but not an impossibility. It should be understood by now that all the traditional ways of handling these types of situations did not work--for once again, we are facing the exact same plight. Is humanity doomed to failure by handling this present situation in the same manner as it had in the past?

Last edited by Christo Alado (2009-02-26 19:22:04)

genniii wrote:

Christo Alado wrote:

Regards their seemingly random incarceration, my understanding of it is this: the dark is working tirelessly to subdue the light in others. That is the reason why, I feel they were targeted... their light of love had shone just a bit too bright and so they were tagged.

I too Christo feel that is a valid point!

I have heard that in ancient Egypt once the priests had taken over. There would be an advance party would first pour some sedative into the village well to reduce potential for problems. Then would come the 'Recruiters'.
Recruiters would come often enough to every village and interview the growing children. Of course they themselves would be trained to recognize those with potential.
Potential for great love or great intelligence or any other greatness would constitute a potential for problems to the establishment of the Powers That Be. Those children would be removed (given scholarship so to speak) to be inducted into either priesthood or King's Palace service.

I have long thought that Earth's periodic stupid wars were instigated with an eye to pruning off our best and brightest and bravest promises dwelling in flesh and blood just before the fullness of bloom just for the protection of those families holding the power to make up the war yet not put themselves in harm's way.


Our culture has a few habits that need to be changed eh?

To say just "a 'few' habits to change" is an understatement, but nevertheless a correct statement indeed.

Through my many meditations, I've gained an understanding that all of the old ways of thinking will not bring Heaven to Earth. I'm seeing, for the first time, actual promise and hope that the actuality of such being realized in our lifetime is quite possible and it all begins with peaceful and loving intentions. I have more to say about this line of reasoning, that I plan to post in the "Fair enough Question" thread in the General Items forum. But first, I need to organize my thoughts to better express that which I am sensing. We can pull through this in a far more peaceful manner that many are currently trying to reason through. Love will win in the end if we all strive for it to be so.

Amethyst wrote:

You're probably all getting tired of these poems but I'm just going to post two more by the same man who has been in Guantanamo since 2002 and is still there.  Both poems show incredible optimism and faith in the face of imprisonment.  As the author put it, "Praise God, who has granted me faith and made me a Muslim."

I am glad that you have shared these poems with us, Amethyst...they are BEAUTIFUL to read...the indomitable human spirit in overcoming enormous obstacles and pain is always inspiring and moving...and this causes us to reflect upon our own lives...it gives us hope and appreciation...

Last edited by organic (2009-02-27 13:17:21)