.

.

.

Estar aquí

Saberme despierte

Disfrutar de lo que los ojos ven

Sonreír

Mirar a la ventana

Mirar el punto mas brillante

Buscar luz

Sentir tenerla

Inhalar

Soltarme lento

Otro día para este cuerpo

Pensar en ti

Poner mi lengua entre los dientes

Buscarte

Con los ojos cerrados usando solo la nariz

Volver a tomar aire

Inflarme hasta la pelvis

Dejarme caer hasta abajo del respiro

Preguntarme si es que duermes

Preguntarme si te quiero despertar

Buscar la ventana

Buscar el punto más brillante

Buscar luz a toda costa

Oír que los pájaros han vuelto

Sentir silencio

Volverme a dormir

Caer

Caer en el sueño

Fácil

Como alumbrar un cerrillo

Oír música también cayendo del cielo

Dios

Color

Lucero

Flor

Amor

Lamento

Timbre

Nombre

Sombra

Fuego

children’s dreams / al-yarmouk, palestinian refugee camp in damascus, syria 

this (archived link) was a very recent article on conditions at MDC, here's some excerpts:

THE PEOPLE DETAINED AT MDC OFTEN don’t see the sky for weeks at a time. The little sunlight they get falls through small windows at the tops of a wall in the recreation center. When it’s cold, inmates stand in the squares of light, lifting their faces to the ceiling, to soak it in.

“You’re not breathing fresh air,” says Brandon, who adds that the windows are so small it’s sometimes hard to tell whether it’s day or night. The lack of access to fresh air is what makes MDC distinct from other federal prisons, where inmates are typically allowed an hour a day in outside yards. Brandon says the indoor rec centers resemble a high school gym, a square contained by four walls, only one with a window, with nothing inside but a basketball court.

“They cannot shower or shave and are sometimes not even afforded toilet paper. Meals are not provided with utensils, forcing inmates to eat with their hands. They have no ability to consult with loved ones or supportive figures. Ironically, individuals on ‘suicide watch’ don’t even receive psychiatric care.”

There have been a series of lawsuits against the detention center for inhumane conditions, particularly during the Covid pandemic.

At least three federal judges in recent years have refused to send defendants to MDC because of the conditions and frequent lockdowns, which can leave inmates in their cells for days at a time with no access to showers. In January 2024, federal judge Jesse Furman issued a 19-page decision about MDC’s conditions, citing a case in which the jail had refused to transport an inmate for surgery to repair his cheekbone, which another inmate had broken in a fight. The defendant had to have his cheek rebroken ahead of his surgery in order to heal properly.

In August 2024, a federal judge from the Eastern District of New York said he’d identified “shocking instances of brutal violence” within MDC in just the previous five months, including two homicides, two stabbings, and an assault resulting in fractured eye socket. He highlighted an incident where three inmates stabbed another inmate 44 times in an “open area without supervision,” and the judge wrote the response to the event took an “unconscionably long time.”

Just this past December, an inmate died in custody after MDC’s medical staff missed a lung cancer diagnosis for an inmate complaining of chest pain. A jail doctor ordered a CT scan in early November 2023, and the test was delayed for months. The inmate wasn’t told about the mass the CT found until the end of April 2024, after he was already coughing up blood and had repeatedly requested his test results. “The results were somehow missed by the health services department, and the delay was unfortunate,” the medical staff wrote in response to the missed diagnosis.

“The MDC has a long and documented history of inhumane conditions, including chronic overcrowding, severe understaffing, and woefully inadequate medical care,” Estevao tells me. She adds there have also been repeated reports of maggot-infested meals, and recently an inmate had to be treated medically for choking on a piece of plastic in his food.

“What people experience at MDC, it’s not just punishment, it’s neglect, chronic understaffing, systematic failure, dehumanization.”