A poem.
Mother, why are they fighting each other
if they are of the same kind?
‘All blood is mixed’, you used to repeat –
Then if we are all of us one family
Why still this violence, I pray you tell me?
‘For peace, my child, for peace.’
Mother, why am I so far from home,
why did they bid me come here?
I follow their orders as best as I can,
Still one question gnaws me again and again –
Mother, why must I fight these strange men?
‘For peace, my child, for peace.’
Mother, why are the clouds all afire,
why are soldiers crowding the streets?
‘For the good of the people’, the government says,
‘We fight for our way, our way is the best…’
Mother, what good is it for, this bloodshed?
‘For peace, my child, for peace.’
Mother, I cannot accept that there
is no better way than this.
I desire to know why you wish that I
Would fight like my fathers, die as they died.
Still you offer me only the same vague reply:
‘For peace, my child, for peace.’
Mother, the battles are over for now;
I survived the bloody fields.
My son calls war a game you play
With plastic guns; I dread the day
He’ll want the truth and I’ll weakly say
‘For peace, my child, for peace.’
My Longing Shall Gather 