CHILEAN poet Pablo Neruda, the winner of the 1971 Nobel Prize for Literature, chartered an old ship in 1938 to resettle some 2,000 Spanish refugees who were living in squalid camps in Paris in his homeland. They were fighters for the Republicans in the lost Spanish Civil War and had fled to France to escape persecution from the fascist Franco government. Like Ernest Hemingway, Neruda was on the side of the Spanish Republicans, and that group also included the best writers of the time. And as the Chilean government’s emissary to the Paris refugees, Neruda said his work for the Spanish refugees in Paris was the most important one he did in his entire lifetime to serve humanity. A poet committed to fighting the fascist overlords to create a better world.
A few decades before Neruda wrote poetry for the troubled Americas to chronicle the continent’s yearning for freedom, the struggle against right-wing despots and the shackles of colonialism, our very own national hero Dr. Jose Rizal wrote “Mi Ultimo Adios” just before his martyrdom. Before our society lost its passion for civics, the poem was required reading for young students to imbibe two things — love of country and hope for light after the darkness. And kids in the public elementary system in the barrios recited lines from the “Mi Ultimo Adios” as they trudged through the paddy dikes on their way home after school. And, after class, on the lonely grazing areas astride their carabaos.
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