They came to give us a minute, maybe two, of their stories of life behind prison walls. Not enough time to tell it all, but enough time to throw the imagination of the free into bewildered and uncharted territory. Jail is home for the incarcerated man or woman awaiting a trial that never seems to come.
This was projected in poems by the inmates from the courtyard of the Port-of-Spain Remand Prison on April 26, as prisoners participated in the first-ever Facebook Live-streamed event from a prison in the Caribbean. Voices From Inside—T&T, is part of the 2017 NGC Bocas Lit Fest.
The event was spearheaded by US writer, professor and activist Baz Dreisinger who has been working assiduously for prison reform around the globe aimed at giving voice to the voiceless, faceless people who live in prisons but simultaneously to showcase the redemptive power of the arts and the benefits of a humane approach to justice that aims to repair instead of enact revenge.
There were heartfelt readings of original poems by prisoners, excerpts, from writer and educator Debbie Jacob’s published Wishing for Wings—a book of writings from young men at the Youth Training Centre (YTC) where she has been voluntarily teaching English for several years.
Some of these men were past winners of the NGC Bocas Lit Fest My Life Prison Poetry competition.
Inmates like Ryan Ramoutar—who wrote three novels that have all been given some high ratings on sites like Amazon, Smashwords and Kodo— read his winning piece.
Ramoutar, the author of Kiss of The Killer and Breakable Moments has won the Author’s Appreciation Award from the Nalis in 2013.
Ramoutar, a product of abandonment, extreme poverty and the suicide of his parents has been writing about his world from his cells with pencils and copy books.
Nicholas Khan’s moving delivery of The Wall, a touching illustration of life as it begins and promises to end in prison because of the slow and incoherent justice system that exists, was enough to move the listener to tears.
Khan entered the prison system illiterate at 16 and is now 27, and has not yet had a trial. He told the T&T Guardian he has faith that he will be free one day. “In many ways as much as I want to get out, prison prevented me from becoming a memory.”
To share this pioneering moment were local celebrities Machel Monatano, Kees Dieffenthaller, Muhammad Muwakil and Anya Ayoung-Chee who read from Dreisinger’s book Incarceration Nations: A Journey to Justice in Prisons Around the World. The readings were based on Dreisinger’s accounts of time spent in Jamaica working with law enforcers and prisoners enrolled in the Rehabilitation Through Music programme at the island’s General Penitentiary.
It spoke of experiences, the acute unsanitary conditions and even violence that occurs behind prison walls. The long wait by prisoners on remand for a trial is the same as in T&T. Dieffenthaller also blessed inmates with a performance of his song Lion, which he said he wrote at a very low period in his life. He encouraged inmates to never give up as sometimes things have to burn all down for newness and victory to come.
Former International Soca Monarch Montano promised acting Deputy Commissioner of Prisons Cecil Duke, that he would work with T&T Prison band, Outfit International in the future.
The band is made up of inmates and officers who teach music and they provided the music for Wednesday’s event. Lead vocalist Trevor Haunte’s renditions of Sparrow’s 1967 classic, Education and Ras Shorty I’s Watch Out My Children were well received by the appreciative audience.
Duke told the T&T Guardian, he was truly happy to see such an event take place.
He praised Debbie Jacob for her years of commitment to the prison service in volunteering her time to teach literacy.
He boasted that as a result of her determination, there is now a space, the Royal Reading Room which gives incarcerated fathers the chance to read, do homework, bond, or surf the Internet with their children.
Dreisinger told the T&T Guardian when she began volunteering as an educator at prisons 15 years ago, her eyes opened to the need for some forum where the incarcerated could communicate their stories with the world.
“The idea is to number one, break down the barriers between outside and inside; justice should be a transparent system; prison should be visible.
“We should know who is in there, why and what the conditions are like, it should not be this big hidden world,” Dreisinger said.
She explained big part of the live stream is to say “we see you” to humanise the prison population that doesn’t get seen or heard and is forgotten about. She reiterated the event was to give voices to the voiceless and also connect prison struggles around the globe.
The professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York and teacher of English and African-American studies runs a programme in the US called Prison to College Pipeline which is about creating access to education from literacy to university.
She has already began this programme in Jamaica and is hoping to move up the Antilles introducing it. Here, she has partnered with UWI St Augustine Campus, to start the programme in local prisons.
Dreisinger said she is appalled at the conditions of prisons everywhere, and though she had not seen the Port-of-Spain Remand in its entirety, she imagines the challenges are no different.
She is a firm believer that it is a rehabilitative society that is needed generally.
“I don’t like the term rehabilitation because most people in prison were never habilitated in the first place.
“They were not given opportunities. I just met a gentleman here, one of the poets who said he was illiterate before he came to prison; he has been convicted of nothing, but yet awaiting trial for eight years now.
“That it should take him coming to prison to learn how to read shows that the rehabilitation that has to happen, has to happen in society,” Dreisinger said.
“It’s not about rehabilitating people. Let’s rehabilitate a society that is producing people to come to prison.”
Watch the full event on www.facebook.com/bocaslitfest