FATHER, WE LEFT…
Father, we left, we abandoned our home,
The whole world now lives like wandering gypsies.
We took your photo down from the wall,
And placed a pair of tears as a lock on the door.
We left, oh we left, we buried our homeland,
Gathered in metropolises like a nest of hedgehogs.
(Have you ever seen a tree being shaken,
How its fruit clings together like figs in a row?…)
We squeezed ourselves into new struggles,
Lost our fields, our sleep, our song.
Everything here is neatly displayed in luxury stores—
Even a shop for the soul, to mend a broken heart.
We left, and placed your grave in a video,
To visit you on Sundays through a glass screen,
Laying flowers in thought, two tears, a cigarette,
Living by symbols, a world run by manuals.
We don’t return to the village—we carry it with us,
Now everything fits in a box.
This box, father, is called a computer,
Through its glass, you can meet everyone.
Through its glass, you find a bride, you hold a wedding,
You kiss your brother’s sons across continents,
And weep for your mother from thousands of miles away,
As they lower her to rest… on a video call.
We will be together again, when we come down there,
Up here, we were scattered forever.
I won’t write more—you already know,
I am weak, and drown in my tears.
We don’t know where we’re going—there’s no time to think,
We rush, for rushing is simply in fashion.
The whole world now lives like wandering gypsies,
Ah, leave… and weave baskets of sorrow.
