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“Memorandum on
Tlatelolco”
Darkness engenders violence
And violence demands darkness
To coagulate in crime.
That is why October the second* waited until night
So that no one might see the hand that clutched
The weapon, but only its flash in the dark.
And in that light, brief and livid, who? Who is he who kills?
Who are they that are in agony? Who are dying? Who are they that flee without shoes?
Those who will be thrown into prison?
Those who will rot in the hospital?
Who are those who will forever remain mute out of fear?
Who? Who? No one. On the following day, no one.
Dawn broke on the plaza cleanly swept; the newspapers
Spoke of the weather
As their main story.
And on the television, on the radio, and in the cinema
There was no change of program,
No interrupting news bulletin nor even
A minute of silence at the banquet.
(And so the banquet proceeded.)
Don’t search for that which is not there; clues, corpses,
For everything has been given up as offering to a goddess:
To the Devourer of Excrement.
Don’t sift through the archives because nothing has been recorded there.
Ah, violence demands darkness
Because darkness engenders the dream
And we can sleep dreaming that we can dream.
But here I touch an open wound: it is my memory.
It hurts, therefore it is true. It bleeds real blood.
And if I call it mine I betray everyone.
I remember. We remember.
This is our way of helping the dawn to break
Upon so many stained consciences,
Upon an angry text, upon an open grate,
Upon the face shielded behind the mask.
I remember. We must remember
Until justice be done among us.
-- Rosario Castellanos (1925-1974)
*In 1968 student protests in Tlatelcolco Square in Mexico City were met with a massive military response. Officials admitted to 32 deaths, but the real number -- estimated in the hundreds by journalists -- was buried in the ensuing cover-up.
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