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You who live secure
In your warm houses
Who return at evening to find
Hot food and friendly faces:

     Consider whether this is a man,
     Who labours in the mud
     Who knows no peace
     Who fights for a crust of bread
     Who dies at a yes or a no.
     Consider whether this is a woman,
     Without hair or name
     With no more strength to remember
     Eyes empty and womb cold
     As a frog in winter.

Consider that this has been:
I commend these words to you.
Engrave them on your hearts
When you are in your house, when you walk on your way,
When you go to bed, when you rise.
Repeat them to your children.
Or may your house crumble,
Disease render you powerless,
Your offspring avert their faces from you.


Translated by Ruth Feldman And Brian Swann


Anonymous submission.

Added: 24 Feb 2003 | Last Read: 2 Dec 2008 5:33 AM | Viewed: 5618 times

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