APRIL IN THE MIRROR

 To justify the lack of courage, the scribbled paper. That screams for me. The pain in the glottis is a cry I never dared to give, I was so docile. It was, that past participle that crept inside of me as long as I allowed it. Sweetness can carry so much wound and never allow itself to be contaminated. 

I don't want to remain docile, I want to be insubordinate against what I see, I want my voice and my sobs to tear the veil of apparent stillness and acceptance, I want what I am allowed to see and feel in nightmares, in the real lives of others who have no voice, to be insurgent and not just candor of acceptance. I want to expose the cry of those who silence injustices and drag them, like me, into boxes, wardrobes, drawers, under beds, into the countenance of mirrors that reflects, in the end, so little of that constancy that grinds our judgment. That brings zero results to what we continue to live. And we call this pain life. My dear ones, when we have great pains, pets, unresolved processes, we do not live. Survived. Those who suffer are not alone in the pain, but in the choice to maintain that pain. And we give the pain to drink, so that it does not grow, so that it is not noticed, so that it is something that only outlines that we are alive. We are quiet, apathetic, and obedient. 

In the Middle Ages, pain was treated by you and faced, whether you wanted it or not. The dead were brought into the house, veiled and honored, looked at, mourned and forgiven, so that there would be no people pretending to themselves that they did not know of their departure. The so-called denial. They were buried in the churches, in the churchyards, nearby. Today, to make life easier for us, we hide death, mourning, memories to the most distant and episodic place, tombs, dark-lensed glasses are put on to that they cannot see our pain, or to hide that it is absent from us. That he slipped away, as if dying were something unseemly, shameful or cowardly. We pour out flowers and candles, by contagion and duplication, in a senselessness of feelings, if there are any. We whiten the grief and produce diseases, we wipe the tears and carry the wounds until they lead us to a level of absence or, by contagion, of mortality. 

Have we suffered less or has it stopped hurting? Do we die less or do we stop living? We get used to everything, we fight against ourselves, when we accept all those artifacts that others want us to carry. We bought dresses and suits to match the ties and body bags. What humanity resides in the homes, where we hand over those who have educated us, who are hidden from us? 

 We live an affective superficiality that produces mental illnesses in droves, we drag the dulled affection to a hiding place of our own, where we can control its dullness, its explosion or implosion! Our pain has to be in front of us, it has to be identified, digested, perceived, so that we can treat and heal it, we must not hide it. We are not children and we do not work magic, like pulling rabbits out of a hat. The pain is and is no longer there.  We are masters of conformism, defeated by the time of stress and inglorious causes, we vomit social networks and likes, we are slaves to appearances, we do not dignify those who have passed through the earth, with the sweat of struggle and ideals. Where are ours? So many Dantas on earth. We feed them when we do not question the whats and all the whys, when we accept the substitution of values. We are the immense flock of shame and emptiness. Trapped in a century that had so much to offer us. We chose the gadgets, the shortcuts, the costumes and the masks, the carnivals and the festivities. We cover ourselves with the same blankets as the Dantas, when we accommodate ourselves to them! If freedom has color, if it smells, if it tastes like stone or dust, if it is chewable, if it is reproducible, if it can be aborted in the open, maybe it is not even freedom! We are captives of the fear of not being equal, and so similar to the humiliated animals in the circus, who are beaten to obey, until we might forget what freedom is like.

April is always a memory that we want to fill with the poetry of a romantic past that has taught us nothing. And even if they shout that we are cowards, that we are boasts, we pretend not to listen to them and continue to supply for the same begging, that of the scarcity of dreams. What a dishonor is this that befalls each one of us and makes us diminish the humanity of being so many! Where does the boldness, the courage that chills and tells stories of us, in the almanacs, in the annals, in the publishers, in the bookstores, escape to us? Where does the miracle of life lie in us, which allows itself to be weakened by fatal and superficial adversities? What have they done to us?

Yesterday it rained and through the window, between the rainstorms and the gusts of wind that are lashing the grasses and branches, I push these silent things that I have mastered and to which I have not allowed grudges to grow, and instead of the sadness of the world, I prefer the joy of life, the transformation of nature that teaches us that a dry day full of pollen can bring gusts of voices that teach the trees tolerance and the flexibility that keeps them straight and beautiful. Animals don't fear rain! Neither do trees! Another world unfolded in natural beings (who obey their inner nature, instead of escaping from it) much more pleasant and real than the daily human defeats. Inglorious fights. Nature always conquers itself through these qualities that humans take a long time to learn, to understand, in interactions with their peers. 

If it is war that we want, let us at least take up arms, to do the will of the old people of the restelo, let us take sticks and stones and hurl them against the system that silences us, that defeats us daily, that afflicts us with dying and anachronistic utopias...

I have met men of inestimable value, not for words or political verbiage, but for deeds and nonconformity, who rolled up their sleeves and did it. They didn't lean against the counters, talking about the easy, they didn't adapt to what was wrong, they didn't sit at the tables to eat while they collected bills in the drawers, not even behind the doors, they didn't shut up, they weren't convinced, they didn't accept, they didn't let themselves die! And they went to the streets and showed what the material of their dreams was made of! Today, all of them must tremble with rage because they cannot be here to make them fruitful, to give them light in a dignified birth. Those men who were our fathers, grandparents, great-grandparents, great-great-grandparents, brave, authentic, without social networks, but with a blood structure stronger than steel, who did not allow themselves to be molded by circumstances, in solidarity with others and tolerant of themselves, but that they fought, that they felt and allowed themselves to shout what was wrong, not only with two punches on the table, but by destroying what was wrong, rebuilding and drawing sketches further ahead, setting limits, tearing up mountains and crossing the gods. They worked for the sake of the whole. They didn't look at themselves, competing with their neighbors. Really, human. It was in those times that the statesmen were designed, responsible, demanding, who left high values as a legacy!  Facing the problems and not hiding them under the rugs. Not that! Where is their fiber in our DNA? Where did the bakers of Aljubarrota disappear? In what part of our body and soul does humanity reside?

It gives me the idea that we are reflections of lies, shadows apparent in form. Where does this content we read in history books live? We are herds of Dollies, cloned, shallow, dressed in Sunday suits every day, as if every day was Sunday and not the day of our cowardice. And we multiply posters and parties, prayers and setbacks, recipes and indignities, coloring everything with the shortcut of happiness. As if happiness could coexist with our lack of verticality! We replicate the bê-á-bá of mistakes and not the injections of courage. We are boredom, impaled straw for cattle. 

What is the use of so many centuries of existence, if capital, more than blood, governs the world where we are mere slaves? Slaves of imbecility. Tell me, what will become of those who remain here when the Keith Richards who are all of us are gone? What is the legacy we leave if they are not values, if they are not peace, nor love, nor respect nor tolerance?  If it's just about competitiveness, wouldn't it be better to click the button right away and solve the matter? Hypocrites contributing to wars, without even thinking about the herd of innocents? Gaza, Ukraine, Congo, Nagorno-Karabakh, Syria, Yemen, Tigray, and I don't know how many more. If we don't know how to deal with each other, how dare we want to destroy other planets? If we don't know how to heal ourselves, how dare we infect and condemn from birth the unfortunate people we continue to bring into the world? It's not just about loving and multiplying. Because we need to multiply love and not the other way around. 

Why so much religion that teaches you forgiveness and ethics, if all that is born of your practices is war, hatred, envy, lies, fraud, opulence, opportunism, sadness and disunity? Who defined the world, ours, the one where we live as humanity, if the one who governs us is its opposite? 

I take the pain of everyone I see with me, wherever I go, to bed, to the countryside, to the supermarket, to the lightning that breaks me, because I look at them with eyes to see, because I care what they feel, what they think, what they dream, I swear that I try to dismantle the pain of others, to understand it, to turn it upside down,  Hang it, squeeze it, and all I can think of is that it's not pretending, it's not deceiving, it's not protecting lies and corruption, it is not by contributing to the differences in opportunity, it is not by feeding the gods of war and capital that we will change the system. And this, all this is gangrene, if we do not have the courage to cut it off while there is still time! Look the fucking mirror. See what we produce. And it doesn't smell like freedom, even though it's April, it doesn't taste like happiness, even if it's well dressed, it's not pretty, even if it's made up. No, we are not worthy as long as we do not operate the lack of love for our neighbor and prioritize the other, which is us. As long as we do not take care of the species that inhabit us, as long as we do not protect the weakest, as long as we do not grow in ideals. I know, appearances can do more. But don't talk about April, or about poets, or about the pain you don't know, or about the rigged system, or about human frailties. If you don't even ask yourselves what your ancestors would do, if they could, if they were here. Will-o'-the-wisps, frugalities, perfunctory and solemn successes. Spare me your second-rate theatre. 

And as Quino's Mafaldinha used to say, stop the world I want to leave.