17th of November
We started a fire using some dry twigs; boiled
some water; we washed ourselves, naked, outside
in the open. The wind was blowing. We were cold.
We were laughing, perhaps not from being cold.
Only bitterness was left at the end. My cats, outside
the locked house, would certainly climb up the window
to scratch the shutters. And you can’t write anything
to them, to explain, so they don’t think you forget of them.
You can’t.
18th of November
Kontopouli-Moudros. A short period of time. A long
trip. The lorry in the rain. Pockmarked landscapes
outside the wet truck window: almond trees, a house,
a second house, the chimney, drenched sheep, two
kids hand in hand with their school bags; I hadn’t
seen school children in the road for a long time. We
arrived.
Innumerable hands shook my hand, oaths the rain can’t
wash away; I’m a mother with many children. I sit
in the rain and I call, my children, my children and
I am the child of the children and I have to lower myself
just to fit under the tents of Moudros, to raise myself
to the level of their eyes, to wipe the rain off their cheeks
since the sun and the rain turn into leaves so easily.
Libros Libertad 