I long for freedom

In the desolation of prison and the stillness of your cell, you sit in a corner with all your senses on alert, waiting for one of two things: A voice from within to keep you company for the night, accompanied by the memories of faces of comrades and those you love. You talk to them and they talk to you, as if they were right there in front of you. Prison gives you ample time, and more, to ponder your loved ones’ faces. Or you hear the creak of the cell door announcing the presence of guards directly overhead. You stop breathing and your heart races.

And between this and that is heaven and earth, peak and abyss, beauty and ugliness, hope and despair.

Prison is a sick thing that strangles your spirit and kills everything human within.

A ray of light remains — you don't know where it comes from, but you cling to it like a savior.

I often think I’ve been forgotten. Prison days are suffocating and all alike, until the faces of your loved ones appear to you through the small window in your cell door. Then peacefulness enters your heart, your breathing slows, and you spend your night recalling these faces over and over again until your eyes come to rest under closed lids, armored now against your nightmares, which come every night unbidden. You mumble to yourself that these bleak days will dissipate, and a voice rises higher and higher inside you, saying: I long for freedom.

Zizo Abdo has been imprisoned pending investigations in a case in which he is charged with belonging to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, conspiring to overthrow the regime and calling for unlawful protests.