Homeland

My country, your yellow rotten fang
is stabbing my very throat;
push it in or take it out, don’t leave me wallowing
like a butterfly pinned on the wall.

My country, a shooting-ground in a circus,
I am the target upon your stage,
the muzzle of the gun against my open eyes,
and it’s my finger on your trigger.

Fan-like, in the rhythm of a phoenix,
I, your tenant, die and resurrect—
like some cannon fodder beneath your colors,
like a leech sucking at your vein.

Like a mule, I carry dutifully
your rusty past, my sweet scrap,
yet my only body is being torn apart—
and you don’t feel sorry for it.
I won’t bargain anymore—what else have I got to sell?
My life weighs nothing on your scales;
I lost my one and only life,
And I forgive you, my one and only country.

From the photo story "Lebanon" by Anahit Hayrapetyan