The Bullets of the Poets

The Revolutionary War in Nicaragua against the oppressive and corrupt dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza was led by women and many of the fighters were women and many of them were sensitive poets. These Sandinista women had to put aside their inhibitions about killing along with their sensitivities as artists, to bring compassionate social change and equality to their country.

Bullets of the Poets is about these women at a time in 1986, when the Regan Administration was backing a Contra war to destroy the new socialist, democracy the women sacrificed their innocence and youth, to bring about.

In 1978, a 22-year-old woman, Dora Marie Tellez, commanded the Sandinista forces that took the city of Leon from the well-equipped Somoza army. Earlier that year she had successfully negotiated the demands of her guerilla group in a daring raid on the National Palace, taking senators hostage in exchange for such important political prisoners as FSLN leader Thomas Borge.

“If the revolution has opened spaces for women to develop all their potentialities, then it is a space we have won for ourselves since the war against the dictator.” - DORA MARIA TELLEZ