In the end, civilizations perish because they listen
to their politicians and not to their poets.
—Jonas Mekas
Toomaj Salehi sang through the square
in Tehran and was abducted and beaten,
tried and given the severest punishment
of death...on charges of corruption
in the world.
He had the audacity to criticize
the regime, defend the oppressed
and must die no matter if the world
cries out.
And so it was with Bruno,
marched through the streets,
his tongue nailed to his jaw
so that he could no longer speak,
immolated in the Campo dei Fiori
by the righteous.
And Lorca, who had done more damage
with a pen than others had done with a pistol,
was slain among the olive branches;
his words flew like brittle leaves,
soared beyond the dictator’s grasp.
Likewise, Victor Jara sang
my verse is a dove looking for a place to nest
and the “nightingale” was silenced,
guitar fingers crushed, body riddled
with lead, while Pablo, accosted
in an ambulance told the soldiers:
you will find only poetry here,
poisoned in his hospital bed.
The old general languished
beneath a monument of their texts.
And Rushdie, who survived
but lost an eye in a sacrifice for truth,
outlived the austere cleric
who had condemned him.
The list is long and distinguished
because wherever there is light
it must be extinguished by those
who flourish in darkness.
Robert René Galván, born in San Antonio of Indigenous/Mexican heritage, resides in New York City where he works as a professional musician and poet. His collections of poems include Meteors, Undesirable: Race and Remembrance, Somos en Escrito Foundation Press, Standing Stones, Finishing Line Press, and The Shadow of Time, Adelaide Books.
