‘They tried to bury us. They didn’t know we were seeds.’
Quisieron enterrarnos, pero se les olvido que somos semillas.
“They buried us, but they didn’t know we were seeds.'” The quote comes from poet Dinos Christianopoulos, who was sidelined by the Greek literary community in the 1970s because he was gay.
The Human Rights movement is going to come back… like so many seeds around the world we will break through the concrete… in this case concrete and steel filled with extra pounds of lies hate and fear.
Muhammad Ali reminded us that it is not about how often we are knocked down but how many times we continue to get up.
We have some difficult days ahead and we will have to be smart and strategic. We will be tested everyday as we live within a country where the insane are governing one of the great democracies.
I remind myself of some struggles that went through some dark and dangerous days and eventually found some justice. I have met survivors, from Chile, Argentina, China, South Africa, Estonia, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemalan, Uganda, and, yes, Mexico. I lived in Nicaragua during the last nine months of the Samosa dictatorship. We watched our young men damaged by the Viet Nam war come back to hate-filled Americans, and we have all seen the attacks on human and civil rights movements in this country by the FBI. And lest we not forget our god-filled lynchings of the past — a lot of this madness supported by a book called the Bible. Those rounded up in Chile and Argentina stayed strong and kept hope alive as they were tortured or killed and late at night they wondered who might be killed next. But they never gave up and we cannot give up.
Yesterday I made a round trip of some 14 hours of driving to meet a man’s family who had been killed by a racist rancher in the Nogales area. A 14-hour trip of driving and most people stayed in their lanes, there were speed limits, and guard rails especially at some most dangerous curves which were well announced. Today’s victorious government will break the rules of road and life’s etiquette .
Winning does not mean you were right or just… we have seen our government over the years embrace laws and policies that it took decades to reverse because they were unjust and unfair to one and all.
I am going to take better care of my health since I want to run with you towards the future. I want to live to see accomplish what is right and just.
We just need a little bit water blessed by love and hope and we will break through again and take our rightful place in the sun, moon, and rain. The winds of the four directions will carry forward our prayers, our drum beats, our songs, and chants of freedom and justice to everyone everywhere.
