Raised from the Ground

yet the stones did not rise up, is this what men were born to do, and when finally we stopped fighting, we were alone, the guards had left, doubtless in sheer disgust, which was what we deserved, and then my father started crying and I rocked him in my arms as if he were a child and swore I would never tell anyone, but I can no longer remain silent, it’s not just a matter of eight hours or forty escudos, we must do something now if we are not to lose ourselves, because that isn’t a life, two men fighting each other, father and son or whoever, purely to amuse the guards, it’s not enough that they have weapons and we have none, we are not men if we do not now raise ourselves up from the ground, and I say this not for my own sake but for the sake of my dead father, who won’t ever have another life, poor man, only the memory of me beating him and the guards laughing, as if they were drunk, if there was a God, surely he would have intervened then. When the voice stopped speaking, everyone stood up, there was no need to say anything more, each man set off to follow his own destiny, determined to be there on the first of May, determined to hold out for the eight-hour day and the wage of forty escudos, and even today, after all these years, no one knows which of them it was who fought with his own father, our eyes cannot bear the sight of too much suffering.

From hillside to woodland, these and other words did the rounds of the latifundio, although no one ever mentioned that father-son fight, because no one would believe it, and yet it was true, and meetings were arranged in Monte Lavre too, some people were afraid, but others were not, and so when the first of May arrived, everyone was ready, and those who felt afraid stuck fast to those who showed no fear, that’s how it is even in time of war, said someone who had been in the war, although whether as one of the brave or of the timorous we don’t know. A lot of gasoline and diesel was consumed that day, the spring air was full of fumes from the endless stream of jeeps and trucks laden with rifles and masked guards, they wear masks so as not to feel ashamed, and when they reached some town or village where there was a barracks, they would stop for a conference with the general staff, exchange orders and discuss the situation, how are things over in Setúbal, and in Baixo Alentejo and in Alto Alentejo, and in Ribatejo, which, don’t forget, is also the latifundio. Armed patrols roamed the main streets and side streets, hoping to sniff out subversion, and from high vantage points they surveyed the inland sea like fish eagles, to see if they could spot the black or red flag of a pirate ship, as if anyone were going to run up such a flag, but the guards are obsessed, they can think of nothing else, and what they saw was perfectly innocuous, men strolling up and down in the squares, talking, all dressed in their skillfully darned and patched Sunday best, because the women of the latifundio are experts at patching the seats and knees of trousers, you should see them rooting around in the rag basket in search of just the right scrap of fabric, then placing it on the offending trouser leg before carefully cutting the fabric to size and sewing it on, it’s a job requiring great precision, I’m sitting on the step outside my front door patching my husband’s trousers, well, he can’t go to work naked, it’s enough that he’s naked between the sheets.

Some will think this has nothing to do with the first of May and the eight-hour day and the forty escudos, but they are people who pay little attention to what goes on in the world, they think the world is this sphere rolling through space, pure astronomy, they might as well be blind, for there is nothing more closely connected to the first of May than this needle and this thread in the hand of this woman called Gracinda Mau-Tempo, who is patching these trousers so that her husband Manuel Espada can celebrate the first of May, the day of the worker. The guards pass right by the front door in a military-looking jeep, and Gracinda Mau-Tempo draws her only daughter, Maria Adelaide, closer to her, and the girl, who is seven and has the bluest eyes in the world, watches the jeep pass, these children seem singularly unimpressed by the sight of a uniform, there she is with her stern gaze, she has seen enough of life already to know who these guards are and what that uniform means.

After dark, the men return home. They will spend a restless night, like soldiers on the eve of battle, who knows who will return alive, strikes and demonstrations are one thing, they’re used to that and know how bosses and guards usually respond, whereas this is more of a challenge, denying the latifundio a power that has been passed down to them from their great-great-great-grandparents, You will work for me from dawn to dusk all the days of your life, in accordance with my wishes and my needs, on the other days you can do as you please. From now on, Sigismundo Canastro won’t need to get up so early, nor will João Mau-Tempo or António Mau-Tempo or Manuel Espada, nor any of the other men and women, who are still awake, thinking about what will happen tomorrow, it’s a revolution, an eight-hour day on the latifundio, It’s a gamble, win or lose, in Montargil they won, and we can’t be seen to be less than them, in the middle of the night, they hear the guards’