THE BALAD OF THE OPERATOR – MARIA DIMITRIADI, Fidel Livorno

Translated by Christina Kostoula, PhD

THE BALAD OF THE OPERATOR
Record: Political Songs (1975)
Song: Maria Dimitriadi
Music by Thanos Mikroutsikos, in poetry by Wolf Birman (translated by Demosthenes Kurtovic)

“In Santiago, in the years of slaughter, many fell
and where to find names
And in a word – here is Chile –
someone filming the scene of his murder

Ah,
the power comes out of the fists
and not by kind people –
power comes out of the mouths
and not by mouth

Comrades known this –
it was, it is, and it remains true.
And this is the bitter truth of Unidad Popular

Let this film lesson be ours.
I saw the work of the soldiers
the massacre
I saw scenes that everyone knows

• the people running on the cobblestones
  to be saved

And rifles to sweep the streets
and proletarians lying dead
I saw the children tearing the bullets
and women thrown on the dead

Ah,
the power comes out of the fists
and not by kind people –
power comes out of the mouths
and not by mouth

Comrades known this –
it was, it is, and it remains true.
And this is the bitter truth of Unidad Popular