Vrijheid; een nieuwjaarswens

Er zijn van die projecten waarover je niet kan twijfelen.

Vrijheid / Freedom van Marion Bloem is er zo eentje.

Freedom

If being free is: you be quiet
for I have something to say

If being free is: you behind bars, because
then we don’t have to be afraid
of all your being and doing differently

If being free is: rigidly determining
the day of tomorrow by allowing today’s day
to be a little less day

If being free is: closing the doors
and watching freely on the screen
what should have safely been kept at bay

If being free is: sleeping quietly all the time
because the voice of others has been purposefully
taken from them

If being free is: eating what and when you want
but dropping the peels into the newspapers
in which the hunger is being silenced

If being free is: not having to know what freed me,
keeps me free, takes me
prisoner in freedom every day

If being free is: waiting until the other
frees me from the fears I rely on
religiously

If freedom plasters my thoughts
If freedom blows everywhere around me
and inside of me
but is not capturable for you

If freedom protects me
against your ideas that are too
different to me

If freedom for me today seems so
evident, and you don’t
know what that means

Then freedom is tails for me
and a beheading for you
Then freedom is vapor, and arbitrary
But perhaps it does allow me
– with mutual appreciation of course -
to allow you some
of my abundant freedom
temporarily or for a longer duration of time
as to free you
from my suffocating freedom

English translation by Angela E. Roe
From Dutch original by Marion Bloem

The poem "Vrijheid" was made by Marion Bloem more than ten years ago. The poem was selected by “Het Nationaal Comité 4 en 5 mei” and a video clip was made and broadcasted several times a day on Dutch television.
In 2005 Tjeerd Oosterhuis and Marion Bloem made an audio clip for “Een Royaal Gebaar”, the first most successful internet campaign ever, to claim asylum for refugees who had stayed longer than five years in the Netherlands.
On the 30th of March 2011 Marion Bloem invited poets, translators, writers and artists from all over the world to volunteer translating her poem. One month later 30 translations were available. There are still new people, translators, poets, professional authors, filmmakers and artists from all over the world joining the Freedom Project every day.

People who use their network to inspire friends to contribute to this project. Many stories are there to be told. Some translators live far away from the city, out of reach and have no computer, no internet.

The intention is to continue finding translators, filmmakers, musicians and artists to pass on the awareness about the fragility of the concept Freedom.

Eerder de voorbije week hoorde ik al een mooie Russische lezing van het gedicht op muziek van Edwin Paanakker. Het filmpje maakte zichzelf.
De gebruikte beelden zijn bewerkte beelden genomen vanuit de trein, vanop de fiets, ronddraaiend van plezier op een plein in een stad; vrije beelden, constant in beweging, constant veranderend van kleur, van emotie.
Onvatbaar, zoals vrijheid.
Daarachter heb ik een 'stroom' van beelden en foto's geplaatst die ik allemaal van het internet heb geplukt.
Een overdaad aan informatie (nuttig en onnuttig, lelijk en mooi), voorbijrazend.
De vrijheid van het gebruik van beelden. Het misbruik van beelden om een vals beeld van vrijheid te creëren. Te snel om erbij stil te staan. Zo gaat dat ook.
Jammer soms.
Enfin, 't is klaar...

Freedom

Woorden: Marion Bloem

English translation: Angela E. Roe

Russian translation: Evgeniy Abdullaev

Stem: Teodor Ajder

Muziek: Edwin Paanakker

Concept, camera, montage, bewerking: Swoon