By Alejandra Garcia on May 29, 2024 from Havana
The mausoleum of Jose Marti.
Jose Marti, the most universal of Cubans, died in Dos Rios, in eastern Cuba, on May 19, 1895, shortly after he gave new impetus to the independence movement in Cuba and started a new period of struggle against the Spanish colony. He died at the age of 42 and left behind him hundreds of works that had individual and collective freedom, justice, solid principles, and moral values at their core. Today, Resumen Latinoamericano honors his death and his example.
The mausoleum that honors the Apostle Jose Marti, in Santiago de Cuba, preserves the solemn silence of the tropical forest, in the hours that followed his death, on May 19, 1895. Every day, it is interrupted only by the chords of the Elegy to Jose Marti, composed by the Commander of the Revolution, Juan Almeida Bosque.
His remains are guarded, without rest, by a guard of honor; the white flowers are always present; the Cuban flag rests on his tomb, and the sun falls all over him, throughout the day.
This space, one of the most intimate of the Santa Ifigenia cemetery, at the foot of the Sierra Maestra, honors the life and work of the most universal of Cubans, in a silence that resembles that told by witnesses of his death, and that historians and journalists have recalled for 129 years.
“Just a few hours after Martí’s death, silence ruled. It was as if everything had ended right there, as if the war did not continue,” Cuban journalist Manuel Lagard assured.
The Apostle had arrived in Dos Rios, Granma province, a few days before the bullets hit his body. There he was in the Mambi (Independence fighter) camp, after days of long walks through the bush. Despite his small physique, he surprised his companions with the agility with which he managed on steep trails while carrying his rifle and a backpack with few belongings.
“Until today, I have not felt like a man. I have lived ashamed, and dragging the chain of my homeland, all my life. The divine clarity of the soul lightens my body. This repose and well-being explain the constancy and joy with which men offer themselves to sacrifice,” he told his fellow emigrants in a letter written on the field.
He was not as fragile as he was thought to be. He was a lively man, who jumped here and fell there. He endured like the best and saw more than anyone else. “It was as if one were blind and he was the only one who could see,” said Lagarde, versioning the testimony of the Dominican Marcos del Rosario, Martí’s friend, who accompanied him during the days of the war.
His comrades in the manigua were not only admired for his fortitude, but also for his sensitivity. It is said that when the troops stopped on their way to Dos Ríos, he spent his time writing. He would put two or three words on a blank sheet of paper and look at the bush, and then trace other letters on the paper.
Although he was a man with great ailments, “he kept attending to the wounded until the early hours of the morning, working incessantly in the organization of the newly born war, and maintaining correspondence with the foreigner, all in his scarce hours of rest”, said researcher Roberto Perez Rivero.
The National Hero died on the banks of the Contramaestre River, amid the buzzing of the Spanish army’s shells. “The shots hit the Master’s body, the overhead light bathed him, he released the bridles of the steed, and his loosened body went to lie on the beloved Cuban land. Not even a cartridge was missing from his revolver, bound to his neck by a cord,” professor and historian Rolando Rodriguez described about that May 19.
The discharge of rifles silenced the manigua. Today, the quiet solemnity of those mountains prevails in his slab; but “Marti always comes back to life, with the vital force of the beautiful word, which brought men to their knees for their homeland, and the action that, in the face of death, made them bow their heads,” Lagarde described.
photos: Bill Hackwell
Source: Resumen Latinoamericano – English