Singing for our lives in Eugene, Oregon

THE CROWD IS GROWING. A small band of three musicians is setting up a microphone and speakers. Behind them looms the newly installed black iron fence that surrounds the Eugene Federal Building, where arrested immigrants are questioned in the offices of ICE.

Two rows of color photos are tied to the black grating of the barrier. They depict immigrants who have recently died in ICE custody. Most are originally from Mexico or other countries in Latin America, but there are also two from Cambodia and two from Iran, both places I have visited. People are leaving flowers at the base of the fence. A woman with a lovely iris bouquet explains that the flowers are in memory of a beloved local activist who died a few days before. The woman says she doesn’t think the deceased activist will mind sharing her flowers with the victims of ICE.

The people around me are overwhelmingly past sixty. There are gray-haired ladies dressed in fringes and hiking boots, bearded men in sweats and T-shirts with slogans on their chests. I imagine that many of these same people marched in the 1960s to support civil rights or to protest the Vietnam War. Today they gather to sing protest songs against the extralegal arrests of their immigrant neighbors by ICE.

Many carry signs. One simply says, “No!” Another has a beautiful drawing of a butterfly and the words, “The only orange monarch I want.” Off to one side, two women, tall and straight, hold a banner between them that reads: “Veterans for Peace.” I think of my son, a veteran who served in Iraq. He also has concluded that peace is far more worthy than war.

I notice a white-haired lady in a flowered T-shirt topped by a plaid flannel jacket who proudly waves a placard with colored photos of a KKK hood, a masked and goggled face, a Nazi SS hat, and a red MAGA baseball cap. Above and below the photos of hats, the words read: “Same Shit, Different Hat.”

My favorite is a black and white sign that says, “Fascism is here; so are we.” Another sign expresses similar sentiments in a different way. Bright yellow and held aloft by a woman in black jeans and an outdoor windbreaker, the cardboard is scrawled with the words, “Did you ever wonder what you would do in Nazi Germany? NOW YOU KNOW.”

I am the granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor and the author of two WWII historical novels based on true stories from Nazi Germany. These slogans hit me in the gut.

My attendance at the demonstration is spontaneous. I have come from California to visit my friend Barbara, who lives in the university town of Eugene, Oregon. For as long as I have known her, which is more than fifty years now, Barbara has been an activist for city beautification, for the environment, and for local and national politics. Today she invited me to join her at a weekly event organized by the BeLonging Space and the Interfaith Alliance with Migrants. They call the Tuesday noon gathering at the federal building “Sing for Our Lives.”

The new fence surrounding Eugene’s Federal Building has, in response to public outcry, maintained a wedge-shaped brick forecourt open to the public. It is known locally as Freedom Plaza. The singers have gathered here. One lady sets up a thermos of iced hibiscus tea and cups on a small plastic table. My friend contributes a package of Oreo cookies. Two crates filled with binders of songs are available for participants to use. Barbara tells me that the songs are arranged in alphabetical order so they will be easy to find. There are lyrics from protest songs old and new, some familiar, some unknown to me.

Promptly at noon, a woman comes to the microphone. She explains why we have gathered, gives thanks that Freedom Plaza has been left open, and says those with flowers in memory of their friend can bring them up any time. Then the singing begins.

People thumb through the notebooks when the moderator announces songs. The band supplies musical accompaniment. Occasionally others approach the mic and initiate a song. Our voices are muted except for when a familiar chorus repeats, and we burst forth with enthusiasm.

“We are gentle angry people
And we are singing, singing for our lives
We are gentle angry people
And we are singing, singing for our lives.”

Songwriters: Holly Near, Singing for Our Lives lyrics © Hereford Music

A tall, young woman dressed all in black—black mask, shirt, leggings, combat boots—steps to the microphone and reads a poem she wrote earlier this morning. “It’s very much a work in progress,” she says. Her voice is mesmerizing; the words lyrical and evocative. If this is a work in progress, I think, what a glory the finished poem will be.

A woman of about forty, wearing a small yarmulke atop her dark hair, steps to the microphone. Barbara leans over to whisper, “That’s my rabbi. She participates with the group every week.” The rabbi speaks of togetherness with our neighbors and how we are all immigrants. She initiates a song and sings clearly into the mic. Barbara leans over again. “Her mother and father are here this week. They are both rabbis too!”

I look at the yellow sign that asks what we would have done in Nazi Germany. These rabbis in Oregon are doing what many German rabbis dared not do. They are lending their voices to protest injustice. I close my eyes and hope they will not meet the fate of their German predecessors.

Could it happen here? If we are not vigilant, will history repeat itself?

We sing for most of an hour. At the end, we are instructed to turn and face the street, our backs now toward the government building, and “greet the community.” We join hands and sing the iconic song of protest, “We Will Overcome.”

Some of the protestors, those closer to the street, wave at the passing motorists. A few drivers honk in response. Someone inspired by the Portland Frog Brigade bounces up and down on the sidewalk in an inflatable frog costume to remind everyone that peaceful, creative dissent can undermine fear-based narratives.

I stand holding my friend’s hand and sway to the nostalgic rhythm of the song.

“Oh, deep in my heart, I do believe, we shall overcome someday.”

I look out at the crowd—at the many gray heads and white beards, at the people like me with canes, at an elderly, frail woman in a wheelchair—and I wonder . . . when will someday arrive?

My whole life I have watched activists like my friend protesting and picketing, trying to make the world a better and kinder place. Sometimes I have joined them. More often, I have simply cheered them on. Today, as we walk back to Barbara’s car, I am uplifted to have been part of the sing-in. This Oregon group of gray-haired contemporaries has shown me that even at 83, there are ways I can still protest injustice.

First published on kathrynslattery.substack.com on 05/16/2026