EZLN – First part: The Motives of the Wolf
First part:
The Motives of the Wolf
Rubén Darío
Nicaragua
The man with heart of lis,
cherub’s, celestial tongue,
the minimal and sweet Francis of Assisi,
finds himself with a rude and grim animal,
fearful beast, of blood and theft,
furious jaws, evil eyes:
the wolf of Gubbio, the terrible wolf,
rabid, has devastated the land;
has cruelly destroyed all the flocks;
has devoured the lamb, has devoured the shepherds,
deaths and damages he has caused are countless.
Strong hunters armed with irons,
were destroyed. The hard fangs
accounted for the toughest dogs
as if they were goatlings and baa-lambs.
Francis went out:
and searched for the wolf
at his burrow.
Near the cave, he found the enormous beast,
who, upon seeing him, ferociously jumped
at him. Francis, with his sweet voice,
and raising his hand,
told the furious wolf: – Peace, brother
wolf! – The animal
gazed at the man with the rough sackcloth;
let down his surly air,
closed the aggressive open jaws,
and said: –Alright, brother Francis! –
What is this! –exclaimed the saint—. Is it the law that you live
by horror and death?
The blood spilt
by your diabolical snout, the grief and terror
that you spread, the crying
of peasants, the screams, the pain
of so many creatures of Our Lord,
should they not contain your diabolical bitterness?
Do you come from hell?
Have, perhaps, Luzbel or Belial,
instilled you with their eternal resentment?
And the great wolf, humbly: Winter is hard,
and hunger is horrible! In the frozen forest
I found nothing to eat; so, I searched for cattle,
and sometimes ate cattle and shepherd.
The blood? I saw more than one hunter
on his horse, carrying a goshawk
on his fist; or running behind the wild boar,
the bear or the deer; and I saw more than one
get stained in blood, hurt, torture,
from the hoarse trunks to the deaf clamor,
the animals of Our Lord.
And it was not due to hunger that they were hunting.
Francis answers: There is bad yeast in man.
When he is born, he comes with sin. It is sad.
But the simple soul of the beast is pure.
You will have,
from this day onward, something to eat.
You will leave in peace
herds and people in this country.
May God mellow your wild being!
Alright, brother Francis.
Before the Lord, who binds all and unties all,
in faith of promise, give me your paw.
The wolf gave his paw to the brother
of Assisi, who in return gave his hand.
They walked to the village. People saw,
and what they saw, they almost could not believe.
Behind the religious man went the fierce wolf,
and, with a low head and still, it followed him,
as a house dog, or a lamb.
Francis called the people to the square,
and there he preached.
And said: Here is an amiable hunt.
Brother wolf comes with me;
he swore to me not to be your foe,
and not to repeat its bloody attack.
You, in exchange, will feed
this poor creature of God. Amen!
Answered the people form the whole village.
And then, as a sign
of contentment,
the good animal moved head and tail,
and entered the convent with Francis of Assisi.
For some time, the wolf remained quiet
in the holy asylum.
His large ears listened to the psalms
and his light eyes became moist.
It learned a thousand talents and played a thousand games
When he went to the kitchen with the laymen.
And when Francis prayed,
the wolf, the poor sandals, caressed.
He went out to the street,
he went to the hill, came down to the valley,
came into the houses, and was given
some food. They saw him as a gentle greyhound.
One day, Francis went away. And the sweet wolf,
the meek and good wolf, the honest wolf,
disappeared, went back to the mountain,
and his howling and fury began again.
Again, there was fear, there was alarm,
among neighbors and shepherds;
filled the surroundings with fear,
courage and arms were no good,
for the fierce beast,
never gave truce to his fury,
as if he had
the fires of Moloch and Satan.
When the divine saint came back to the village,
all came to him with complaints and tears,
and with a thousand wails they gave testimony,
of what they suffered and lost
by that infamous demon wolf.
Francis of Assisi went grave.
He went to the mountain
To look for the false butcher wolf.
And found the vermin by his cave.
In the name of the father of the holy universe,
I conjure you – he said –, Oh wicked wolf!,
to answer to me: why have you gone back to evil?
Answer. I hear you.
As in a deaf struggle the animal spoke,
the foaming mouth and the fatal eye:
– Brother Francis, do not come too near…
I was quiet there in the convent;
I visited the village,
and if they gave me something, I was happy,
and ate meekly.
But I started to see that in all of the houses
there was envy, anger and rage,
and in every face burnt fathoms
of hatred, lust, infamy and lies.
Brothers made war to brothers,
the weak lost, the evil won,
female and male were like dogs and bitches,
and then came the day when they all hit me with sticks.
They saw me humble, I licked their hands
and feet. I followed your sacred laws,
all creatures were my siblings:
brother men, brother oxen,
sister stars and brother worms.
And thus, they hit me and threw me out.
And their laughter was like boiling water,
and the beast revived within my gut,
and I suddenly felt a bad wolf again;
but always better than those bad people.
And restarted to fight here,
to defend myself and to feed myself.
As the bear does, as the wild boar does,
that in order to live they have to kill.
Leave me in the mountain, leave me in the crag,
let me be at my liberty,
go back to your convent, brother Francis,
go back to your way and sanctity.
The holy man from Assisi said nothing.
Looked at the wolf with a profound gaze,
and parted with tears and heartbroken,
and spoke to the eternal God with his heart.
The wind from the forest carried his prayer,
which said: Our father who art in Heaven…
December 1913
Of sowings and reapings
October, 2023
Almost 15 years ago, in our words, the nightmare was forwarned. It was during a Semillero and it was through the voice of the deceased SupMarcos that we spoke. Here it goes:
Of sowings and reapings
(January 2009)
Maybe, what I am about to say has nothing to do with the main theme of this roundtable, or maybe it has.
Two days ago, the same day in which our word spoke of violence, the ineffable Condoleezza Rice, US government official, declared that what was going on in Gaza was the fault of the Palestinians, due to their violent nature.
The subterranean rivers that run through the world are able to change their geography, but they sing the same song.
And the river we now listen to sings of war and grief.
Not far from here, in a place called Gaza, in Palestine, in the Middle East, just next door, a heavily armed and trained army, from the Israeli government, continues its advance of death and destruction.
The steps it has followed so far are those of a classic military war of conquest: first a massive and intense bombardment to destroy “neuralgic” military posts (so they are called by military manuals) and to “soften up” resistance fortifications; then an iron grip on information: everything that is heard and seen “in the outside world”, that is to say, outside of the theatre of operations must be selected according to military criteria; now intense artillery fire over enemy infantry to protect the advance of troops to their new positions: after that an encirclement and siege to weaken the enemy garrison; then an assault to conquer the position by annihilating the enemy; finally, the “cleansing” of the probable “nests of resistance”.
The military manual of modern warfare, with some variations or additions, is being followed step by step by invading military forces.
We don’t know much about this, and it is certain that there are specialists on the so called “conflict in the Middle East”, but from this corner, we have something to say:
According to the photos from news agencies, the “neuralgic” military posts destroyed by the Airforce of the Israeli government are houses, huts, civil buildings.
We have not seen any bunkers, barracks, military airports or cannon batteries among what has been destroyed. Then, we think, excuse our ignorance, that either the aircraft gunners have bad aim or in Gaza there are no such “neuralgic” military posts.
We don’t have the honor of having visited Palestine, but we suppose that in those houses, huts and buildings used to live people, men, women, children and elderlies, and not soldiers.
We have not seen resistance fortifications either, only debris.
What we have seen, is the so far futile effort to cordon off information and several governments of the world wavering between playing the fool or applauding the invasion, and a UN, already useless way back, publishing lukewarm press releases.
But wait. It now occurs to us that perhaps, for the Israeli government, these men, women, children and elderly people are enemy soldiers and, as such, the huts, houses and buildings where they live in are barracks that need to be destroyed.
And the enemy garrison that they want to weaken with the encirclement and siege of Gaza is none other than the Palestinian population living there. And that the assault will seek to annihilate that population. And that any man, woman, child or elderly person who manages to escape, by hiding from the predictably bloody assault, will then be «hunted down» so that the cleansing can be completed, and the military chief in command of the operation can report to his superiors «we have completed the mission.»
Excuse our ignorance again, perhaps what we are saying is, in fact, beside the point. And that instead of repudiating and condemning the crime in progress, as indigenous people and as warriors that we are, we should be discussing and taking a position on the discussion about whether it’s «Zionism» or «anti-Semitism», or that it was the Hamas bombs that started it.
Perhaps our thoughts are very simple, and we lack the nuances and the always very necessary marginal notes in the analysis, but, for us Zapatistas, in Gaza there is a professional army assassinating a defenseless population.
Who from below and to the left can remain silent?
-*-
Is it useful to say something? Do our screams stop any bombs? Is our word saving the life of a Palestinian child?
We think that it is useful, maybe we will not stop a bomb nor will our word become an armored shield that prevents that 5.56 mm or 9 mm caliber bullet, with the letters «IMI» («Israeli Military Industry») engraved on the base of the cartridge, from reaching the chest of a girl or a boy, but maybe our word will manage to join with others in Mexico and the world and maybe first it will become a murmur, then a loud voice, and then a cry that will be heard in Gaza.
We don’t know about you, but we Zapatistas of the EZLN know how important it is, in the midst of destruction and death, to hear a few words of encouragement.
I don’t know how to explain this, but it turns out that words from afar may not be enough to stop a bomb, but they are as if a crack opened in the black room of death for a small light to slip through.
Otherwise, what will happen will happen. The Israeli government will declare that it has dealt a severe blow to terrorism, it will hide the magnitude of the massacre from its people, the big producers of weapons will have gotten an economic break to face the crisis and «world public opinion,» that malleable entity, always in tune with the situation, will turn to look the other way.
But not only. It will also happen that the Palestinian people will resist and survive and continue fighting, and continue to have sympathy for their cause from those below.
And perhaps a boy or girl from Gaza will survive too. Perhaps they will grow and, with them, anger, indignation, rage. Perhaps they will become soldiers or partisans for one of the groups fighting in Palestine. Maybe he or she will face combat against Israel. Maybe he or she does it by firing a rifle. Maybe by blowing himself up with a belt of dynamite sticks around his waist.
And then, up there, someone will write about the violent nature of the Palestinians and make statements condemning that kind of violence and there will be another debate about whether Zionism or anti-Semitism.
And then no one will ask who sowed what was reaped.
On behalf of the men, women, children and elderly of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos
Mexico, 4rth of January 2009.
-*-
Those who were children then, almost 15 years ago, and who survived, well…
There are those who were responsible for sowing what is now being reaped, and there are those who, with impunity, repeat the sowing.
Those who just a few months ago justified and defended Putin’s Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, arguing its «right to defend itself from a potential threat», must now be juggling (or betting on forgetfulness) to invalidate that argument in relation of Israel. And vice versa.
Today, in Palestine and Israel -and all over the world- there are children and young people learning what terrorisms teach: that there are no limits, no rules, no laws, no shame.
And no responsibilities.
-*-
Neither Hamas nor Netanyahu. The people of Israel will prevail. The people of Palestine will prevail. They only need to give themselves a chance and work hard at it.
Meanwhile, each war will continue to be only the prelude to the next, more ferocious, more destructive, more inhumane.
From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast,
Subcomandante Insurgente Moisés.
Mexico, October 2023.
