Is it inherited? is it acquired? is it cultivated? is it lost? is it transformed? is it contagious? through what channels is it transmitted? how does it become collective? is it creative? at what point does it become dignified? when does it begin to distance itself from rancor and revenge? does it get closer to justice?
At what point does it become worthy? When does it begin to distance itself from rancor and vengeance? Does it approach justice?
How does it become the historical root of entire peoples, different in geography, language, culture, history, time?
Is anger the bridge between pain and rebellion?
At what point does anguish, despair, impotence become rage?
What if the disappeared bequeath, conversely, rage to those who search for them? What if they give birth to their parents?
What if the searchers are not looking for comfort, pity, sympathy, the alms of someone else’s ear? What if they are also looking for our rage?
What if all rages have the same root and they, we – the people – find ourselves at that root?
Will we have the strength to smile at each other, to embrace each other, to exchange not only pains, but also the details of the person responsible – his same face (although different), his sardonic laughter, his mocking look, his cynicism, his way of knowing he is immune to punishment, the flag of money?
And if ever, in the unfinished book of history, someone sees a light, any light, that, without fuss or slogans, signals “this light was born of rage”?
And what if what unites us, despite all the differences, is the same rage? Who will have to face us? Who will sentence us to the same defeat of yesteryear, of now, of today? Who will threaten us with a tomorrow equal to yesterday?
Who will lose and who will find?
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Zapatista youth practicing a play for the celebration of the 30th anniversary of the beginning of the war against oblivion. Images courtesy of Los Tercios Compas, copyleft December 2023. Music by Keni Arkana: “La Rage.”
El Capitan.
Mexico, December 2023.
40, 30, 20, 10, 1 year later.