Midnight, our sons and daughters
Were cut down and taken from us.
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat.
In the wind we hear their laughter
In the rain we see their tears.
Hear their heartbeat, we hear their heartbeat.
Night hangs like a prisoner
Stretched over black and blue.
Hear their heartbeats
We hear their heartbeats.
In the trees our sons stand naked
Through the walls our daughter cry
See their tears in the rainfall.
Mothers of the Disappeared is the final song on The Joshua Tree and grew out of the band's close association with Amnesty International and their participation in the Conspiracy of Hope tour during the summer of 1986. The song was inspired and written by Bono following his experiences in Nicaragua and El Salvador in 1986, during which he met members of the the Madres de Plaza de Mayo and COMADRES, two groups of women whose children has forcibly disappeared at the hands of the Argentinian, Chilean and El Salvadoran governments (through the use of 'death squads').Bono, clearly moved by his experiences, wanted to pay tribute to their cause in this song. The melody of the song is said to have been taken from a piece Bono composed back in Ethiopia in 1985, helping to teach the children in the camp basic forms of hygiene (Stokes, 2005). The lyrics, like Bullet the Blue Sky, include criticism aimed at the Reagan Administration, which had backed two South American regimes that seized power during coup d'Ă©tats, and also provided financial support for the military regime in El Salvador (Steverud, 2006).