Like a crystalline river the artist grew in his soul and with his heart in his hand he knew how to make poetry with imagination, and to travel, when the vicissitudes of life and the struggle accompanied him hurriedly through the years.

Juan Almeida Bosque, author of so many works like La Ciudadana, La Sierra, La Lupe, Dame un traguito, pieces chanted and danced by many live eternally in our hearts.

Inspiration, more than a lightning bolt, was an ocean of feelings in which he unleashed passions, in his eagerness to change the denigrating reality that pressed upon the people.

Cleaner boy, ticket seller, bricklayer, painter, the Commander who brought together in the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution, the strength that accumulates years and continues to prove invaluable for the Cuba we are building.

Among mountains and the whisper of royal palms, he remains at the summit of La Esperanza, watchful and serene at his combat post, where the remains of a sensitive man rest, who looms large in history.

Those who had the privilege of knowing him do not forget his leadership style based on example, rigour and direct contact with the people.

His artist’s hands touched many dreams. They say that over the waves of the Caribbean Sea a song was light in the closed night; that an empress’s name bid farewell to those who would be free or martyrs, that a love song can be the seed of a separation.

Whoever has shared that hymn to the most universal feeling which is La Lupe, thrown a compliment to a woman who wants to be looked at or read any of his books, will know of his special human sensitivity and that, in him, beat a heart that never stopped dreaming of beauty.

Today we remember Commander of the Revolution Juan Almeida, the Juan of the humble, of the rebels, of the eternal defenders of the Revolution. That is why on the anniversary of his death, Juan Almeida Bosque calls us to reaffirm more than ever that Here no one surrenders!