'Dolores Ibarruri, "La Pasionaria", inspiration for the character of Agustina Ruiz.

There is a statue of Ibarruri on the Glasgow quayside at Clyde St, a tribute to the 2,100 British volunteers who joined
the Spanish fight against Fascism. Of the 534 who were killed, 65 came from Glasgow.

She would not name her child
What use was a name?
She could never call its name as it played in the street and it could never answer
Unknown soldiers have graves
In concentration camps there are ash-heaps of nameless
Those who lie together in mass graves in europe and asia did not know each other's name
And who can name the dust of Hiroshima?
Whole cities are named after their graveyards
Human Cannon didnt live in a human world - she lived in our world
Her child didnt feel her breast
To her it was blasphemy to name a child in an inhuman world
Cruelty to behave like a human mother in a world too inhuman to let her child live
Motherhood wounded her but the wound did not heal at birth
Death renewed her birthpangs as many times as there are children's heads in the streets
Human Cannon's world had not yet been made human
It might have been nemed after her child's death!
But when she had helped in the long work of making the
world human
She named a village
And when that work is ended all children will bear her
child's name