Now Sing
NOW sing: the guards howling
beat him with obscenities.
…….. But he did.
His legend is
He was singing
……………….. Venceremos
when they shot him.
Even for them, it was too much
The killed him,
they couldn't kill him enough,
Victor Jara
…………… sin guitarra,
who'd held out with bloody stumps
………………………………………….. and sung
by James Scully
from Poetry Like Bread
Curbstone Press, 1994
****
Victor Jara:
“Jara composed 'Venceremos' (We Will Triumph), the theme song of Allende's Unidad Popular (Popular Unity) movement, and he welcomed Allende's election to the Chilean presidency in 1970. Jara and his wife were key participants in a cultural renaissance that swept Chile, organizing cultural events that supported the country's new socialist government. He set poems by Chilean writer Pablo Neruda to music and performed at a ceremony honoring Neruda after the famous writer received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1972. Throughout rumblings of a right-wing coup, Jara held on to his teaching job at Chile's Technical University.
“On September 11, 1973, however, Chilean troops under the command of General Augusto Pinochet mounted a coup against the Allende government. Jara was seized and taken to the Estadio Chile, a large sports stadium. There he was held for four days, deprived of food and sleep. He was tortured, and his hands were broken by soldiers who told him to try to keep on playing the guitar with his damaged hands.