If you were not present in each act and your thoughts did not accompany the daily life of this country - full of joys and sorrows, but always resistant and victorious in the face of adversity - perhaps it would accept, after five years, that you have died.

Since that night of November 25, 2016, when I woke up in shock for the announcement of your departure, I became aware of your passage to immortality. Moreover, there you are, in that distinctive light, guiding the destiny of your people, proudly contemplating the continuity you have formed.

I do not accept your departure, although a snapshot reminds me of the moment when, dressed in the correct military uniform, I paid you honors for 15 minutes at the Provincial Committee of the Cuban Communist Party in Ciego de Ávila and, from sadness and deathly silence, I ratified the commitment to honor you every day, with facts, words and personal example.

I remember the desolation of my people ―your people― when grouped on one side of the Central Highway awaited your return to Santiago de Cuba, the land from where you once left for the capital along with the other bearded men, with the promised and conquered victory, with plenty of impetus to fulfill the Moncada program.

I was there, trying to break through the people gathered to say "Goodbye!" I saw the caravan passing in the opposite direction to the one you drove when the Revolution triumphed; I saw many people cry, even those who, clinging to stereotypes, claimed that men did not cry.

I saw the caravan go by; I felt anguish, pain and I cried! However, when I saw that small coffin I resisted believing that you, with your immensity (in the broadest sense of the word), were going in such a small space.

I was not even convinced by the five letters written on the side, because there was not a way to understand that a man with your altitude, physical and character, would travel there.

In addition, I relived that feeling in the Santa Ifigenia Cemetery, in front of the gigantic rock where they say you rest (and I express it that way because I don't think men like you rest either). I detailed it, over and over again, patiently and without thinking about the line that waited behind to take my position, but I also did not understand that there was room for you there.

Men your size do not die and there is limited room for them. I confirm daily that your space continues to be everyone's and you occupy the immensity of a country and a world in which you have not stopped working in honor of the commitment you made with your people, with all of humanity.