I first became aware of Otto Rene Castillo when I was doing organizing work for the Central America Solidarity Coalition in Milwaukee back in the 80's during the Reagan Administration's war on Nicaragua. Castillo was a Guatemalan poet, activist, guerrilla fighter and revolutionary. In Guatemala, he joined the guerrilla movement with the Rebel Armed Forces, where he served as the chief of propaganda and education. After operating in the Sierra de las Minas for several months, he was captured by government forces and taken to Zacapa barracks alongside his comrade, Nora Paíz Cárcamo in March 1967. There they were interrogated, tortured, and burned alive. Below, his poem entitled, “Apolitical Intellectuals." It is especially fitting for us here in the US as Trump slowly destroys our democracy. It hits so damn hard:
Apolitical Intellectuals Otto René Castillo I
One day, the apolitical intellectuals of my country will be interrogated by the simplest of our people.
They will be asked about what they did when their fatherland was being slowly extinguished like a sweet fire, small and alone.
They will not be interrogated about their dress, nor about their long siestas after lunch, neither about their sterile struggles with the void, nor about their ontological ways of arriving at money. Nor will they be interrogated about Greek mythology, nor about the self-disgust they felt when someone, deep down, got ready to die like a coward.
Nothing will asked of them about their absurd justifications that find their shadowy origins in the round lie.
II
On that day the simple men will come those who never had a place in the books and verses of the apolitical intellectuals, but who arrived every day with bread and milk for them, and eggs and tortillas, those who sewed their clothes, drove their cars, tended their gardens and dogs, and worked for them, and they'll ask: 'What did you do when the poor were suffering, and tenderness and life were being burned out in them?'
III
Apolitical intellectuals of my sweet country, you will not be able to answer.
A vulture of silence will devour your insides. Your misery will gnaw at your souls, and you will fall silent, ashamed of yourselves.
Yes, Maestro, the apolitical folks tell me, "It doesn't matter who wins, politicians are all the same."
Then, when the terror arrives and it's too late, they ask "why?"
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I first became aware of Otto Rene Castillo when I was doing organizing work for the Central America Solidarity Coalition in Milwaukee back in the 80's during the Reagan Administration's war on Nicaragua. Castillo was a Guatemalan poet, activist, guerrilla fighter and revolutionary. In Guatemala, he joined the guerrilla movement with the Rebel Armed Forces, where he served as the chief of propaganda and education. After operating in the Sierra de las Minas for several months, he was captured by government forces and taken to Zacapa barracks alongside his comrade, Nora Paíz Cárcamo in March 1967. There they were interrogated, tortured, and burned alive. Below, his poem entitled, “Apolitical Intellectuals." It is especially fitting for us here in the US as Trump slowly destroys our democracy. It hits so damn hard:
Apolitical Intellectuals Otto René Castillo I
One day, the apolitical intellectuals of my country will be interrogated by the simplest of our people.
They will be asked about what they did when their fatherland was being slowly extinguished like a sweet fire, small and alone.
They will not be interrogated about their dress, nor about their long siestas after lunch, neither about their sterile struggles with the void, nor about their ontological ways of arriving at money. Nor will they be interrogated about Greek mythology, nor about the self-disgust they felt when someone, deep down, got ready to die like a coward.
Nothing will asked of them about their absurd justifications that find their shadowy origins in the round lie.
II
On that day the simple men will come those who never had a place in the books and verses of the apolitical intellectuals, but who arrived every day with bread and milk for them, and eggs and tortillas, those who sewed their clothes, drove their cars, tended their gardens and dogs, and worked for them, and they'll ask: 'What did you do when the poor were suffering, and tenderness and life were being burned out in them?'
III
Apolitical intellectuals of my sweet country, you will not be able to answer.
A vulture of silence will devour your insides. Your misery will gnaw at your souls, and you will fall silent, ashamed of yourselves.
"Nothing will ask of them about their absurd justifications that find their shadowy origins in the round lie."
"A vulture of silence will devour your insides."
Every line of that poem applies not just to the American landscapes as it speeds into raw fascism, but to other scary stuff happening around the globe.
We need new poems about the American media..and British media too, especially BBC.
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