Svenska PEN publicerar en dikt av poeten och tidigare Tucholskypristagaren Faraj Bayraqdar tillägnad den syriska dissidenten och aktivisten Samira al-Khalil med anledning av att det idag är fyra år sedan hon kidnappades.
Den 9 december 2013 kidnappades Samira al-Khalil, tillsammans med Razan Zaitouneh, Nazem Hamadi och Wa’el Hamada. De fyra personerna befann sig på sitt kontor Violations Documentation Center, en organisation som dokumenterar övergrepp och registrerar antal döda i inbördeskriget i Syrien, då en grupp beväpnade män stormade in och förde bort dem.
Det finns inga uppgifter om var de hålls fångna, men sannolikt ligger en islamisk väpnad grupp bakom kidnappningen. Samira al-Khalil, är hustru till årets Tucholskypristagare, Yassin al-Haj Saleh.
Echoes
For Samira al-Khalil
Her voice descends lightly
On the steps of the dungeon, and she is still in pain
In the interrogation room
And I descend lightly
That blanket carried by two
Who go astray
Am I in it or is she?
Her weary voice is revived by what is in my body
My weary body is revived by what is in her voice
How is fire revived?
She was not a condition or a description
But I call her by many names
The echo has wings of that fluttering around me:
Samira....ra….Samira…ra, Samiraaa
A name does not confine its bearer if so desired
But the place
Confined in the torture rooms of Palestine Division
So did it confine her
Or those women or men, together
The plain of Duma, free, with eyelids defeated
Her voice comes
I see several doves
As if once upon a time.
I see several clouds
Her voice comes
As if, oh time, Syria, a dream and a people, will live
Oh time, she will live
Samira al-Khalil is a Syrian dissident and former political prisoner. She was detained for a period of four years, from 1987-1991, for opposing the Assad regime. On December 9, 2013, she was kidnapped by a militant, Islamist brigade in the city of Duma near Damascus. There are several indications that Jaysh al-Islam is responsible for her kidnapping along with three other activists, working in the Center for Documenting Violations in Syria. They are Razan Zeituna, Wa’il Hammada, and Nadhim Hammadi. Four years have passed since their kidnapping without any news.
By Faraj Bayraqdar
Translation by: Shareah Taleghani
