Today in Labor History February 4, 1900: Jacques Prévert was born (1900-1977). Prevert was a poet, surrealist and libertarian socialist who glorified the spirit of rebellion & revolt.

Excerpt from “Song in the Blood”
There are great puddles of blood on the world
Where’s it going all this spilled blood
Murder’s blood. . . war’s blood. . .
Misery’s blood. . .
And the blood of men tortured in prisons. . .
The blood of children calmly tortured by their papa
And their mama. . .
And the blood of men whose heads bleed in
Padded cells
And the roofer’s blood
When the roofer slips and falls from the roof

The Minister of War:
I continue.
A destroyed hospital: ten, a hundred -
and I am modest -
can be rebuilt
And, the project adopted unanimously,
night has fallen,
the hospital was blown up with a few scraps of the neighborhood around.
Day breaks over the city
where the laughter dwindles, dissipates and disappears.
Everything becomes serious again.
Life, like the stock market, resumes its course
and general mobilization continues as normal.

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