The Missing Ones

Although Pinochet is long gone, the mothers, wifes and sisters are still looking for those who were 'disappeared' by his government. Another poem inspired by Sting's music....

Where have all the young men gone

The husbands, fathers, sons

They’ve traded them for money, sir

To fund their lust for guns

 

Left behind are forgotten ones

The mothers, daughters, wives

All for their pound of flesh, sir

Their torturers and their knives

 

Supported by a foreign country

Its currency, arms, but then

No rights for those who live there, sir

Nor for their missing men

 

The women dance a lonely protest

Their mouths shut in their pain

To word their anguish to the air

Their loss of freedom gain

 

One day the money will be gone

And freedom it will reign

An end to Mr Pinochet, sir

For then we’ll live again

 

(Written before the end of Pinochet’s reign in the 1990’s)