letter of january to Obama

Mr President Obama

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W.

Washington DC 20500

Mr President,

The Statue of Liberty sited at the entrance to New York harbor turns her back on the United States of America. If her torch was illuminating your country, Mr President, the five Cuban Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González, and René González would all now be returned to their loved ones in Cuba, and Alan Gross returned to the USA and his wife.

To mark this new -year, I send you this poem written on 20th December 2012 by Antonio Guerrero, one of the Cuban five, and translated by Tony Walton.

For Liberty
For Liberty

blood, struggle, survival

  Miguel Hernández

For Liberty

survival, blood and struggle.

For Liberty

the naked Heart.

For Liberty

with the little I have, I have much.

For Liberty

all I have is yours.

For Liberty

I fix the Sun’s position

and my eyes reflect

all the Light of the World.

For Liberty

resilience like walls,

hands like wings,

mouths like fists.

For Liberty

the essence of twilight,

the cohesion of dreams,

the history of tomorrow.

For Liberty

one verse of a conflicted

omen, which wakes

like a cry in the night.

For Liberty

in a dark tunnel

I know how to recognise

and defend what is right.

We are impatiently for the return of a more genial relationship between Cuba and the United States, and we are hoping for a happy outcome to this lamentable saga of the Cuban Five. It is in your hands.

Please receive, Mr. President, the expression of my most sincere humanistic sentiments.

Jacqueline Roussie

Copies sent to: Mrs. Michelle Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Kathryn Ruemmler, Janet Napolitano; to Mr. John F. Kerry, Harry Reid, Eric Holder, Pete Rouse, Rick Scott and Charles Rivkin, United States Ambassador in France.