She is more than the asphalt floor where I step
She is the path that leads us to freedom
When the oppressed people conquer her
She is the most beautiful part of the city
She is the one who hears our screams
The laughter, the crying, the moan of pain
The bombs, shootings, and brutal blows
Of those who practice war and talk about peace
[Chorus]
She is of the singing, of the drumming
It is the united people who holds her
She is of the flags, of the barricades
She is of everyone because she is of no one
She is neither of the chiefs, nor of the bosses
She is not a possession, she is not a property
Neither of the states nor of the nations
She is of everyone because she is of no one
Street. My second home
First soccer pitch.
They want you only as a path
For those who prey you with black smoke.
They want you as a subject of planners,
Engineers,
Criminologists.
I want you as a subject of poets
Of lovers
And of people rebelling.
I want you
Of everyone who built you but who can’t enjoy you now
Because they were discarded, ‘cause they were dumped.
Every occupation that stands in the downtown area
Has a bit of quilombo in it
Threat to the urban landlordism
Gray monoculture moved by oil and sweat
The sweat of those who come in crowded trains
Every bus that comes crowded from the ghettos, that comes full of turnstiles
Has a bit of slave ship in it
Inhuman transportation of human flesh
To be grinded and deboned at work
Street, you are from all of those
Who outside work are suspects
Of stealing, of plundering, of disagreeing
Or not contributing to the growth of Gross Domestic Product
It was in your squares that a long time ago they raised
Pillories and stables
One who wears the hood and exterminates people in the slum is a bit of a slavehunter
Street,
I want you to be of the women taught since early that they can only play indoors
Because the street is dangerous, ‘cause the street is violent
Because the street is of the boys who don’t know how to respect them
Street, I know you, who turns you into a threat to girls and women
Is the same oppression that makes the houses unsafe
More than the streets
The street is of all the loves
It’s of those who had to occupy it
In order to earn the right to exist
Every moralist discourse which opposes to equality
Which opposes to autonomy over the body
Is a bit of Inquisition Tribunal
The street does not carry privileges,
It has no owner and no price
It’s like the wind, the sun, the rain
The heat, the clouds, the colors
My joy and my pain.
That’s why I came to the street today
June 13, 2013, cold night…
We occupied the street to return what belongs rightfully to it
The place of the most legitimate assembly
On the TV, five thousands vandals without a cause interrupt the traffic
On the streets…
15, 20 or 30 thousands fought for a life without turnstiles
They call us “madmen” just as they called the “balaios” [basket makers – rebels of Maranhão, Brazil, 1838-1840] who faced power head to head
In a country built on bodies, seated on the blood
Of the exploited ones
We were called “violent criminals” as they call violent the river that drags all
But not the riverbanks that overwhelm it
Criminals were also called the Luddites,
Black Panthers, Zapatistas, Feminists
Spain’s militia, Latin America’s guerrillas
The insurgents of Istanbul, Cairo and Athens
Buenos Aires, Paris, Cochabamba
Beijing, Port au Prince, Gaza
London, Soweto, Lisbon
Anarchist workers from Italy or São Paulo
Maroons from Jamaica or from Bahia
Rebels and poets from all peripheries
Madmen, criminals, students
They want us within hospices, prisons, schools
Away from the streets
They want the grids, walls, fences, turnstiles
A city where the cars move, but where people
Are confined
Journalists, doctors, politicians cannot understand
That democracy is much more than just pushing a button from time to time
That we’re willing to make our own history even in the worst conditions
That we have no illusions, nor live in fantasies
That we’re those who move
And so we feel the weight of the chains that seize us
They can, but don’t want to understand
That we already know that the State and the Capital are Siamese twins
They always fight, but they share the same blood and the same heart
They were born together and together they’ll die from the exploited’s hands
That we already know that the state of exception in which we live
It’s actually the rule
That this peace they offer us is nothing but fear
That when this fear passes no one will defend their mansions
And that there’ll always be someone to open the doors from the inside
That in times of bloody disorder and organized turmoil,
Nothing seems natural to us
Nothing seems impossible to change
Now that the TV’s lies are a laughingstock
That the king is naked and his photos are on social networks
That it was in organizing ourselves that we disorganize
And that is disorganizing
That we’ll organize ourselves
Nothing that may happen will take away from us the feeling
Of having stormed heaven
Of having witnessed the life emerging from a cloud of tear gas
We pulled politics out of the profane world’s meshes
Our words are dedicated to
Ademir, André, Carlos Eduardo
Cleonice, Douglas, Eraldo
Fabrício, Igor, Jonatha
José Everton, Lucas, Luiz
Marcos, Renato, Roberto, Valdinete
And to all the anonymous victims of the state’s violence
In its fierce defense of capital
On the street no monument is innocent
Those who died in it reappear to fight on our side
The dead will not be safe if the enemy wins
We fight so they do not die the death of oblivion
We fight to prevent the enemy to win