Mi Dulce Memoria

My sweet memory,
has been buried at the feet
of a split tree,
by this storm of cathodic rays,
horrors and mirage light.
Red poppies,
winds of forgetfulness
make tremble
like sleeping animals.
Sick with amnesia,
the city falls silent.

Preventive wars,
the delusions of a drunk madman
who listens to no one.
The ghosts of Saigon
wander sleepless
through the old city of Scheherazade.
Cassandra said it
but you didn't believe her.
We are not safe,
we are not freer.
History is alive,
vicious and deadly.

My sweet memory
perhaps this sad elegy
will awaken you.
May your kisses bring
that other possible world
that trembles on your lips,
that announces this day.

Walls of shame
bring the shadow of the past,
stealing your light,
darkening our skies.
Men and women of Krakow,
trapped by walls,
read the Talmud by candlelight,
waiting inside the ghetto.
And in Palestine
behind another wall
a man entrusts himself to Allah,
weeps and curses this world
that always forgets him,
that ignores his tears.

Rivers of humanity fleeing
from cold and hunger
dream of reaching far away,
perhaps only until tomorrow.
You no longer remember the trains
that departed from here
laden with your hope
towards old Germany.

The nutshells
break against your coasts.
And the strait is an abyss
that saves old Europe.
From what? Don't you remember anymore?
Emigrant people,
sick with amnesia.

My sweet memory
perhaps this sad elegy
will awaken you.
May your kisses bring
that other possible world
that trembles on your lips,
that announces this day.