Poems from Guantanamo

The 72-page book edited by Mark Falkoff is now available for all to read. The collection is writings produced by the detainees at Guantanamo Bay. These words were written on paper, scratched on styrofoam cups, and etched into napkins. The detainees managed in whatever way was possible for them. The writing was one way to keep some semblance of sanity.



Mark Falkoff is a Guantanamo defense attorney who received poetry from a detainee. In conversations with other attorneys he found they, too, were getting words in various ways. One of the writing detainees, Sami al-Haj, said in a newspaper interview after his release

It is not vengeance that drives me. It is telling the stories of oppressed people everywhere so there is never another Guantanamo.

Excerpts of one of his poems may be found here along with the following others.

Is It True?

Is it true that the grass grows again after rain?

Is it true that the flowers will rise up in the spring?

Is it true that birds will migrate home again?

Is it true that the salmon swim back up their stream?

It is true. This is true. These are all miracles.

But is it true that one day we'll leave Guantánamo Bay?

Is it true that one day we'll go back to our homes?

I sail in my dreams, I am dreaming of home.

To be with my children, each one part of me;

To be with my wife and the ones that I love;

To be with my parents, my world's tenderest hearts,

I dream to be home, to be free from this cage.

But do you hear me, oh Judge, do you hear me at all?

We are innocent, here, we've committed no crime.

Set me free, set us free, if anywhere still

Justice and compassion remain in this world!

Osama Abu Kabir

Kabir, a Jordanian water truck driver was released in 2007 having been charged with no crime.

Death Poem

(A suicide note from Guantanamo)

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."

Jumah al-Dossari

During his six years of detention at Guantanamo Bay al-Dossari attempted suicide several times. Some of his experiences are detailed in the book, Inside the Wire, by Erik Saar, former military intelligence soldier.

al-Dossari recently told his attorney

Whenever I start to feel bitter about the cruelty at Guantanamo, I imagine the faces of the soldiers who were kind to me. Like them, I want the world to be a better place.

What more need be said?

Peace.