A poem on yellow, rubber boots
Muhamed,
Hamo they called him
A soldier in an old army-suit
Thousand times torn
Now stands alone in a corner of another man’s home
And his eye restlessly roams
It’s the frontline
The beast came down from the sky,
Squeezed and squashed the ground.
His eye roams
Around the room, a haven for a thousand souls
While a veil of sorrow leaves him not
In the corner he spotted something
And his thoughts rushed back home
to his wife and little Almasa.
Boots- like grenades thoughts are shelling in his head
Rubber, yellow,
Exactly the same as Almasa wore before the war
Those that trumped paths and paths.
Oh, how my Almasa would be happy
If only (now) she could put them on
Her feet
Then go down the street
Simply stand sad beside the road
In shoes a thousand times repaired and sawn.
Oh, if only I could take them
And before her feet put them
And say:
“My dearest one,
Here, your father brought you something!”
So then my hand could skilfully
Put them slowly
On her feet.
And then take her to the grave of her mother and my wife (a wife of mine)
So she could experience live rare moments of a true happiness
That no one will ever take from us.
Oh, when I remember just how small she was
You could lovely see her in mother’s lap
There, home,
In our Home
That is how someone else’s
Became beasts made us
Break into other people’s homes
Despite all that we had our own.
A nasty life it is
To be a foreign in a foreign
And whoever comes, and whoever I visit
Foreign, foreign, foreign
God, is there nothing worse?
You see, my Almasa
Has no boots
And I see in her eyes, a silent request:
“Daddy, bring me boots.
No matter what kind
No matter if hollow or rotten
Merely to cover my bear, little, red feet
So I could,
Like others kids,
Step out
And not feel ashamed
Because these kids here, daddy,
Do not understand what faith came upon us
Do not understand what it means not to have, or have but only barely.
Daddy, tell me,
is it the same, back there, just like this
Everybody has all while we have nothing
became these kids scare me
that now there isn’t anything left but ruins.
If it is so
better you and I would be
to die with our head held high
when I, this little, already know
how hard it is to live of others people’s help
then how ashamed are you
when they see our bread weighted by a gram
tears in your eyes, fists clenched strongly.
We will survive somehow together
despite the thousand holes around
just take care there
with the devil’s people
and don’t think of me
but keep an open eye
I will make it on my own
mother taught me long ago
what and how needs to be done
not to starve to death all alone.
So , when again you came
and we put on brand new suits
we shall go to mamma
because she’d always said:
“Not even a dead woman likes to be alone.”
Should I
take these boots
I was never a thief
a question in Hamo’s head floats.
Perhaps exactly this child
of her boots dreams
and there is nothing worse than a child’s sadness
and nothing takes longer than a child’s hope.
Perhaps it, just like my Almasa, has nothing to wear
and gazes sadly down where the children’s path may lead
When you have nothing.
For a long time Hamo fought inside
first he’d take the boots and then not
and, then again, the thought of seeing his little one happy wins.
So fast he snatches rubber boots and puts them in the backpack
But as he was walking back home
as if he carried the weight of the world
He could hear his thoughts: “You stole!”
The remorse: “You stole!”
Drumming in the head.
For a moment Hamo stops
and then ahead he drops
Dead
Because the yellow, rubber boots
Attracted bullets hot and hard.
His last thoughts went around
His mind tired of devil’s
Angry bullets’ strikes.
There, my Almasa is left
Without a father or a mother and
YELLOW, RUBBER BOOTS.