A bit more, and things will get better, just a tiny bit more ….
Nothing can put an end to a person’s aspiration to humane living conditions, that hope cannot be extinguished.

–

Read the original version (russian)

As the saying goes, there is calm before the storm
In the morning, clouds darkened the sky
Like wild colts, the prisoners immediately
Began running from here to there and back again, fleeing from some kind of danger
Where are you going? I asked someone.
They responded,I don’t know, and crossed the border
Another told me, They’re going to attack now. Protect yourself.

But there is no safe place here, and no one takes care of anyone.

To my right I heard gut-wrenching screamsand saw them hacking people with machetes.
I fled, running, going nowhere
Later, I found many mutilated people, already dead
Others were alive, but nothing could be done for them
Someone without legs asked for help, but it was the same for them
People paralysed with fear were watching
Something pierced my back, and I felt a hot liquidcome out of my stomach
I touched it. It was blood, and I said,Son of a bitch! They got me And right on target. They shot me.
Calm down, I told myself. This is normal in prison.
At this point, I don’t know if I’m alive or dead.
But you’re reading this.

He touches, longing for elsewhere, longing for the best, longing to overcome fear for good. With his finger, he longs to touch this paradise he had so often dreamed of, to touch the hope of a land that would love him, that would keep him.
This little brother with dark skin is a touching image in this hostile whiteness, far from the plains where he was meant to be servile. You touched me, you reached your goal, here you will be loved, here I will look after you, here you will no longer be afraid, here in my heart you can feel at home.

The first thing I see in this picture is courage; without the fear of dying of hypothermia, by the low temperature or even by being assassinated by the border guards. These men are full of value; threading one of these roads of life to find a way, a better life, a better social change… It gave me… a very nice feeling.

This is what I see, migrants struggling through the awful weather conditions, too scared to stop for a rest, for fear of being caught, but fear edges them on.
Frost bite already attacked their toes and fingers, they continue, wanting a new life, a new beginning, away from the conflict of their countries, they want to eat good food and feel warm and safe. Wanting to watch their children grow-up in a safe environment, and be happy once more, all the things we take for granted.

Those of us in foreign prisons can relate to those migrants in some way or another.

The frost bite we receive every year, until your toe nails are deformed, we also want a new life, back in our own countries, to gain weight and eat good food, yes I can associate and understand because I want the same things, see my children and grandchildren, to hug them and never be parted ever again.

An affirmation of freedom¶

I have a waking Nightmare. Piercing fangs of torture and oppression sinking into my bones, chilling them. So cold, their touch erases all memory of warmth. So frigidly biting, that when sunken into the flesh of my reality, all inertia of though becomes frozen…solid. I am in a perpetual stasis of pain and fear. Excruciating. A perpetual stasis of numbness and hollowness. Crestfallen. I become a blur of screams and madness.

But I once had a waking dream. A waking dream of freedom. Its touch a wondrous and triumphant secret. A secret so powerful and precious, I stole it from my memory and hid it in the cells of my soul.

It has somehow mobilized the immobilized me. It has somehow made some thoughts ambulatory. Its force moves me towards the boarder of freedom. It gives me super-powers, to transgress any element. To overcome the paralysis of fear, to see thru utter darkness, to traverse through the razor sharpness of a wind so cold it splits open flesh. To withstand pain as I leave some of my body parts in my wake. It gives me the super-courage to realize that death is part of the dream and the anti-thesis of my night mare. I see no obstacles. There is no hunger pang that will make me retreat.

I am resolve, amplified by empowerment and magnified by will. I will, not stop. I will, not quit, until I embrace my dream and feel its touch of reassurance. I will, dispel the touch of affliction. I will, remove the fangs that have touched me in a manner that lies beyond the boundary of articulation and description. I will, travel beyond the beyond, to touch my freedom.

Dear Bertrand, dear photographer,

You wait for a caption that traces a parallel between borders and bars, right?
And instead no
Because this deliberately blurry image is reminiscent of paradise: shade, light:
Mystery
Or maybe not
It is an aurora borealis, an incredible aurora borealis
Maybe – despite your hints – photographed in Ostia, a stone’s throw away from Rome
And yes, of course, there is hope.
Like that slow and solemn pace of human figures to remind us that there is always someone worse off than we are
That, like us, dreams of freedom
That is always and only in colour.

__

Read the original version (in Italian)

Looking at this picture, I feel like I am in a lost faraway place, cut off or even chasing the unreachable, confused and with loss of vision.
Despite the obstacles to overcome, this migrant at the Franco-Italian border must confront the situation despite the risks and terrible weather. The weather conditions must not stop him from moving forward, even though it is a major hinderance.
You can sense with your hands, the extremities frozen by the cold. Right here in my cell, it awakens in me a real thirst for freedom, the ability to act freely, without constraints.

Every prisoner, figuratively speaking, is a migrant. We undertake a long or short journey through the places of a prison, according to the duration of our sentence. In my case, that continuous walk within these places has lasted 14 years, and I still have two more to go. It means that we are on a continuous pilgrimage. And we can see, according to the image, that the situation is not any better outside.

Night falls and I do too.
I wander in silence
of my letters without response.
I have forgotten what the world looks like outside,
Where did friends go?
Those who sworn eternal fidelity.
Friends in pain and in happiness,
Those who consoled you in time of sorrow.
They are all darkness today, far away.
Dark and gloomy ghosts.
I can no longer tell their faces,
Neither do they recognise mine.
Being imprisoned means being forgotten.
And here I am.
Forgotten by those who loved me,
Although there are still echoes
In their naked bodies,
They became deaf and indifferent
Within split seconds.
We all want to see the end of the game
Wearing the jerseys of the winners.
I did not win. I was defeated.
And no one wants to be part of
the losers.

Touch is a bittersweet pain and thus, best forgotten.
So, dear heart, think of it not. Think of it not…
Now do not weep for a father’s hug or mother’s kiss.
Dream not of the warmth of a little one’s cheek pressed, hot and soft, against your own.
Nor of the magnetic, liquid hold of a lover.
Wish not for rain-soaked dresses in gardens ripened with Spring,
Or of the roughened chill of snow scratching at your palm.
Close your eyes and forget, think of other things instead.
For touch is love, and love has died,
With old wonders all that now remain.
Be thankful, fool, for a life without a hand to hold,
For that just might be for saving grace.

Exactly! Absolutely! Keep moving. That which is not moving forward is moving backward and for most there can be no turning back. The dark, the struggle, life hardships and trials as soldiers of the struggle we move forward, we march!
The determined spirit understands that the dark is light enough.
The colder the reality, the warmer the dream. Dreams is what we’re after and why we’re moving. Though we chase not the “sunlit prison of the American dream.” This journey toward the other side often comes at a cost. Some pay with their lives, but freedom is priceless and so we keep moving. Maybe the “comfortable” can afford to stay still, a luxury we know not.
Think of the beauty to be had in dying on the move oppose to living in pursuit of nothing.

These people are so unfortunate: having to escape their country and leave everything behind, unable to take anything with them. I wouldn’t want to have to go through that.

In 2012, when I was in Nîmes, I met two Croats who made me laugh a lot. At that time, I was finding my detention conditions extremely difficult. One of them told me, “We’re good here! Food to eat, a warm place to sleep, chess to play: what more do you want? When I go back to my country: prison! Prison there is not like here!” That made me think things over. For all those poor migrants, the road is long. They may be fleeing war or poverty, but to end up with what instead?
Unfortunately, the insecurity of the refugee camps, with their violence and misery, is not the end of their long journey. Many of them will be sent back to their point of departure after seeing a paradise forbidden to them. Often criticized, France is far from unpleasant when you live there by its laws and are lucky enough to belong to this country.

The prisons are not the best in the world, but they are far from being the worst.

The two Croats I met at the police station in Nîmes were deeply worried by the thought of serving time in their own country and I think I understand why. There’s a Moldavan here who is in the same situation as them. For him, too, the idea of doing prison time in his own country doesn’t appeal to him at all. There’s nothing fun about being incarcerated anywhere in the world; nobody will tell you it was pleasant living in such a place, even for a short time, for here, there’s nothing to touch.

No women to attract and bring into the game; these are simple pleasures and yet so important for daily well-being, for the life of a man. That’s what’s missing. That’s what I replied to the Croat who agreed with me. We were resigned to abstinence, even masturbation. That’s much more than being deprived of freedom. It’s being reduced to the state of a thing, no longer having the right to be!

Being able only to work and to educate yourself, if possible, and being reduced to a puppet, kind of like Pinocchio; however, your wood grows not from lying but from a lack of love and affection. As some sort of substitute, I plan to participate in a pottery workshop, so I can knead, model and fantasize a little. Being deprived of freedom is also being deprived of fully being a man. So, hands up, and good night!