In February 2025, JIE alumnus Nascimento Blair was one of the first people in the US to be detained and deported on account of their previous incarceration. Blair had already been released from Community Supervision, had a regular job, was on the Advisory Board of the non-profit organization Rising Hope, and had completed not only a BA but also a Master’s degree while in prison. He was also a published poet and essayist. In 2021, his piece “Sociabilities, Socialities, Violences” was published in a special issue of the online journal Synapsis. A Journal of Medical Humanities. Here we are publishing two pieces that he wrote that bookend his post-incarceration experience, from the day that he was decarcerated in April 2020 to the day that he was deported in February 2025. The first one, “Healing,” a reflective piece about his experience in prison, was written in March 2023; the second one, “When is a Crime Atoned?” written in May 2025, is a detailed account of his detainment by ICE February 4 – February 21, 2025, based on his contemporaneous diary notes during his detention. — JIE Academic Advisor Neni Panourgiá

Article by Nascimento Blair 

March 2023

It feels like yesterday you surrounded me with doubt, despair, with the longing to belong. I sat and watched while you disappeared in my rear-view mirror and breathed a sigh of relief. I must admit that waving adieu made me feel sentimental, but I smiled wryly as soon as I remembered that you caused me ill health.

The days were long and the many dejá vu made me feel dead inside at times. Your scent became so familiar with my mind that for two days after we parted I was showering with cologne to wash off your essence.  

I learned a lot from you. For me, to sit here and say that you did not contribute to my growth would be hypocritical. The sleeplessness of so many nights you caused me has sharpened my nerves to the disappointments I face in this renewed life. Remember the snow fights where strangers started throwing snow at each other? Well, somehow that renewed my faith in humanity and caused me to realize that, even though you were bad to me, still, I did not lose my humanness. 

I sat back and watched as my mother cried and hugged me thinking that she was going to lose me to your grips. There were even times I asked her to stay away—such was the pain in her smile to see you controlling my destiny. Your toxicity was such that my health started to fail.  The restless nights and hot summer days seemed endless as I listened to the cries of the bereft.

Finally, the shouts stopped. And so did the illusion that I was happy with anything—my mother told me I lost my smile. You have reached many, but you have also destroyed plenty of families who somehow thought you would have made a difference in this world.  

Thank you for the new friends you allowed me to meet and the newfound vision you helped to cultivate in me. I guess looking back I never thought I would have survived you. Yet, here I am today, wondering how I allowed you to tame the revolutionary spirit which burns inside me. 

Keep your lessons. Sometimes I wonder to myself if I would have been able to realize my wrongs had you not engulfed me. But you have opened my eyes to the wiles and nuances of the world and even to how I might be perceived from this point forward. 

Look at it like this: I allowed you to feel important and relevant, and you allowed me the necessary time to heal, to reflect, and to love again. The many nights I stood in the cold, trying to numb myself of your reality have let me feel again what it is to be alive now that we are separated.  

I refuse to go on too long, for what it’s worth…. I will ensure that there are no revolving doors for my mistakes, because leaving you in my rear view was only the beginning of my forward movement. Now, as you begin to fade from my memories, I hope to find my smile once more, even if I only smile in private when I remember…you… Prison. 

You can find Blair’s previous publications here
https://minutesbeforesix.com/wp/poetry-by-nascimento-blair/
https://nasblair221.medium.com/its-the-wait-that-gets-you-part-ii-759589ad6b49
https://medicalhealthhumanities.com/2021/01/22/sociabilities-socialities-violences/