Spring 2024 - Recrudescence

Things To Do After My Death

grammar and mathematical skills. The same person also taught Russian and English. Sanyi chose English, though the guards tried hard to convince him to pick Russian. It would have been a more practical language for him, they said. But he could not be swayed, plus he was not electrified about the Cyrillic alphabet. He made up his mind that once he got out, he’d do anything but agricultural work—he no longer wanted anything to do with farms and stock raising. He would be a white-collar worker, a city dweller. Time came to a screeching halt behind bars. The passing of the days, weeks, and years barely registered with Sanyi. His facial hair was so thin that he did not bother to shave it and just let it grow wild. One of the guards said he looked like John of Nepomuk, whose portrait was painted on a nearby church wall, and when Sanyi got out, he could go see it. He didn’t give any thought to the day when he’d be released from jail. He felt content being institutionalized and had no desire to be free. While other prisoners could not stop counting the days until their sentences were up, Sanyi blissfully immersed himself in the myriad days that to him simply felt like a never-ending oceanic current. He often attended mass in prison; instead of reciting prayers, he covertly watched on the silver screen of his mind his own self-directed movies, which projected a future full of joy and hope. At the end of his ten-year sentence—assuming he was not let out early for good behavior—he’d be twenty-eight, with his whole life ahead of him. He was sure that the day he stepped across the prison gates, the sun would shine, and he would feel a spring breeze on his face. He somehow felt certain it would be springtime. Prisoners were not allowed to read the newspaper or listen to the radio. But snippets of news still made their way into the prison through the friendlier guards. The most basic information that came up again and again was that the government was granting blanket amnesty to prisoners. Many prisoners who thought themselves to be the smartest claimed this to be true.

One day a guard confided in Sanyi that a revolution was 101