My little girl, born two months after my arrest, asks,
“When can I be with you for a whole day?”
“When will you come with me to school?”
I say, “Inshallah…soon”.

That night I decide to see her in my dreams but…

I retract…
When I hear the guard call, “Applications!”

I realise I must hand in my form to the governor
So that he will let me spend time
With my little girl,
In my dreams.

So I look the guard in the eyes and say,
As they have taught us,
“Please excuse me,
I won’t go back to those dreams”.

-Adel Abdul Bary, translated from Arabic 
HMP Long Lartin, June 2008