Excerpt (1973)
I have banished suffering Cleared away contempt Set history on its feet.
My domain is the wound And I am the knife Turned back into time.
I have regained my footing And cast off misfortune. Forge the ring, my land, the ring of our identity. A single State for us Who come from absence. We are building cities, Dikes against the void.
The keys to my history No longer open my house. My land, are you the chain I drag at my feet? Our mother is wandering, Our land is exile. On our walls they destroy The trace of our dreams.
Our door is open To all who are driven out
We remain at the door And they throw us a bone
I have no frontier But my life — this immense scar. You deny who we are, What we wish to be, Unity of sap and salt. We, survivors of the worst, You dream of casting us out Through murder and through fear. I have won this land, An estuary promised to so much thirst.
You are losing your source, Dust, your image, Night, your bequest. We, a scattered sheaf, Scorched earth, uprooted earth Alive from the womb of our women. You found your empire Upon our ruins, our dawns despoiled and pillaged. I have a right to the shore where my swelling memory turns blue.
I will defend the oracle of my reign Were it at the price of my death. Without my homeland I cannot live
Were it at the price of my life From your cross I will unnail the dawn. I cannot live without a homeland