In celebration of all mothers, everywhere, of every kind.
natureamazing.net
And oh would we had known—as with so many things—how short a time those babes would be in our arms. How terrible and joyous the days could be. What music and silence.
Americans are fond of saying that we have a history of protest. From the American Revolution to the Vietnam War, we have staged protests from one credo group to another as the Revolutionary Blood has run hot through our veins. We have said accept our voices, we are not violent. It is our history, it is in our blood.
What we have not noted is the American—as in U.S. Government—response. That has not been a voice, loud or silent. It has been one of violence. The U.S. Government has not ever been one of quiet patronage and a “there, there, loud child,” posture. From behind-the-scenes investigations of Eugene Debs voters and followers to the overthrow of foreign governments, the U.S. government has spilled blood. Including that of its own citizens.
Today is an important reminder. Today is May 4. It matters. This is a reminder of how the U.S. Government shot down students. Students. Young people in peaceful protest. Remember the children who placed flowers in rifles which were pointed at them? Those kids. That’s who the U.S. Government killed and wounded. The nation should go dark and mourn. But it doesn’t.
Not many people recall or were there. The American Revolutionary Blood that has been spilled, not by another factious group, not by a foreign government, but by the U.S. Government. Some people still wear the scars.
CSU Archives/Everett Collection
Posted By Spirit of Old
Time and again. I come back to Yeats, and his prophetic words from ‘The Second Coming’. “The ceremony of innocence is drowned. The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” Personally, I don’t associate Yeats’ language with religion, or politics or war. For me it represents a far deeper internal mythology; the one that presents us with the cold choice of a hero’s journey or a sleep that lasts for eternity. NB
This was posted by Nick Bantock, along with the photo (appropriately) of a postcard. Bantock is the author of Griffin & Sabine, and others of their books, the trilogy of which I have. And I will tell of that at some further post coming up.
So, Bantock and Yeats too, as we continue to read our way through our self-isolation. Our quarantine. Who better?
At the beginning of 2000, Marcello went to schools along with those who made the Resistance with him, but he always made others talk. But then, when he found himself alone, he told his story: he was a son of farmers who went to university in the 40s. War came, but he kept studying at night, after dinner, until late now. But the neighbors hadn’t digested this thing that a farmer s’ son went to university and that light on didn’t convince them: they called the police. They beat him up because they suspected him of being against the regime, they didn’t believe he was studying, because he was the son of farmers. ‘ I have notes at home ‘ said Marcello, but ‘ they are full of strange figures: give us the key to decipher what’s written ‘ they answered him. Marcello tells that they finally left him alone and was sent home. And he added that from the next day he became part of the Resistance, because every punch, every slap, every kick, was a good reason for that filth to end.
The other day when I tried to contact Marcello, I found out he was killed by the Coronavirus. It made me remember a book, Fahrenheit 451, where it is said that there are people who learn books by heart, so that the memory of those words continue in their bodies. I would like to tell Marcello that I tell his story, I take responsibility for it, even if you and many like you can’t do it anymore. And to those who think it’s rhetorical I say: memory is the answer to the question of why we are here, and why we are like this. We think memory is like an adventure movie, that we know how it ends. But who cares if we know who the good people are and who the bad guys are, because that’s the reason we have the freedom to say this is rhetoric. I’m angry at those who talk about rhetoric, with those who say those punches taken by Marcello are rhetorical. To these rhetoric experts, I, who teach rhetoric at university, would like to answer with a sentence that happens to have four rhetorical figures: the rants, climax, apostrophe, and hyperbole: ” Fuck off .” ~ (Stefano Massini, April 23, 2020, Clean Square, La7)
Piero Martina, the partisan, 1961, Palazzo Lascaris, Turin
Posted by Il Salotto di Rossana
Writers Ink—Writing and Stuff 