Sunday, 8 March 2009

Conceptualising torture? Chile and the torture truth commission

Context

 

And the trapeze I was sitting on- it was the executioners noose

And the white sands stretching long- they were sun-bleached-bones, loose

With the years of  forgetting-

Olvido perdono- all this- begetting

And the report is a map- 4000 k of torture and death

‘N they don’t give a crap- wine, eat and shop, laugh lest

Lest we should remember,

those-ssh. those-ssh- those facts of september

Don’t think, just be- a democracy made of cheap hotdogs, no books

Eighty percent illitera-cy[1]- gossip mags and saucy looks

most detained women sexually abused

Lives dreams words-  old flesh. now used

 

And lest we forget- we’ve all moved on, no-one cares

Family victims I ‘spect- still holding on- yet everyone  stares:

Look: the black and white photographs of the dead

Or stare at the glossy pictas of American teens instead

Communist conspiracies- why blame the military now

Oh n’ innocent kids-I see- 33 thousand lives- oh wow.

-and the (copper-bought)  traffic

goes on,

down roads of cheap consumerism ,

 stretching long.



[1] Chile is estimated to have 80% functional illiteracy- people who don’t read  in their day-to-day lives.

 

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