At the invitation of Mirtha Pérez, the mother of Nadia Vera, I prepared this short piece on grief and collective memory ten years after the Narvarte murders. It was originally published in Spanish on Memorial Narvarte.

I did not know Alejandra, Mile, Nadia, Rubén or Yesenia. I only learned of their existence after their deaths. It is a double loss to realize the lives one might have encountered had they not been stolen so abruptly and so cruelly. Despite not knowing them in life, I have had the honor to participate in a very small way in trying to maintain their memories and presences over the past ten years.

It began when I read Mirtha’s letter-poem to her daughter, Nadia, marking one year after her murder. Working with independent media outlets in what is called the United States, I translated her letter, published it online, and shared it among friends, comrades, and on social media. As a result, a dear compa who was editing an anthology on collective grief and mourning asked to include the translation in the volume, along with a brief introduction written by me.

There began a correspondence with Mirtha, one that has been maintained over the course of nine years. From afar, I have seen her navigate the loss, heartbreak, roadblocks, injustices, coverups, dismissals, and solidarities. On occasion, I have shared news, written articles, and translated statements and poems. The sad fact is that the vast majority of people in the United States know very little about Mexico. Or at least very little that is true. This is the case even among comrades committed to fighting for justice. All I can hope is that the shine and cry of the small pebbles I have deposited over the years on the beaches of struggle alongside my comrades have reached their awareness. That like me, they may not have known Alejandra, Mile, Nadia, Rubén or Yesenia, but now they see them. And to be seen is to be remembered.

It is humbling to write these words, to contribute to a communal archive of collective memory, with the sense that I have done very little. I tried in my way to lift up the names of the five in the English language. To shout or poke or whisper that, “Hey, look over here. This too needs our care and solidarity.” If anything, it is Mirtha who has taught me how to fight for memory and how to resist through memory. I am indebted to her in ways that I lack the words to express. I have seen how the presence of absence has left an unfillable space, an unshakeable weight. At my best, all I have done is say, “Friend, you don’t need to carry this alone.” And I believe it is through collectively carrying the infinite weight of five stolen lives, the weight of loss, injustice, patriarchy, state oppression, and corruption that we forge collective memory, that we fight back against forgetting, and that together we can walk forward in defiant grief.