A poem
I’ll show you
I’ll give you
a ruined world
I’ll give you lonely people
I’ll give you
dark streets
where thin dogs walk
and steal the bread from beggars
I’ll give you
old and sooty buildings
where families live
without a father
without a decent mother
I’ll give you
thieves aged 14
and murderers aged 18
And you, girl, give me your body
and your hair
give me your breath
close, close to my face
give me your eyes
and the smell of your skin
I’ll give you
plundered continents
exterminated nations
burned bodies
and beheaded children
I’ll give you
hunger and wanderings
fear and sufferings
I’ll give you
wars, exterminations
genocides,
and concentration camps.
And you, give me…
I’ll give you
garbage heaps in city streets
rivers of sewage streaming to the sea
cats, hungry and ferreting,
mice carrying diseases
and black plagues
which spread mercilessly,
taking their victims
from all of woman born
I’ll give you madmen
who lead nations
to destruction
And you, give me…
I’ll give you a God
who’s cruel and cold
I’ll give you
suffering prophets
and crucified apostles
I’ll give you Jobs
and Abrahams and Moses
I’ll give you promises
written on tablets of stone
And you, give me…
I’ll give you
Obelisks and pyramids
built on the bodies of thousands of slaves
I’ll give you flourishing gardens
and green groves
which have sprouted over vales of slaughter
I’ll give you charred earth
green earth
I’ll give you snows
which one day will melt
and will flood our land
and your people.
I’ll give you black clouds
carrying terror and fear
I’ll give you Inquisitors
I’ll give you creatures of Satan
And you, give me…
I’ll give you oil wells
which sprouted in place of tepees
I’ll give you blocks of houses
which sprouted in the place of sloping vineyards
I’ll give you fenced-in camps
which sprang up in the wilderness of ice
I’ll give you crematoriums
which were born out of the young green grass
I’ll give you tanks and planes
fire machines and bombs
created to glorify the names of
leaders and victors
at the expense of the pure souls
who are no more
And you, give me…
I’ll give you
the polished offices
where are buried alive
your parents, your acquaintances, and your friends
I’ll give you
the murderous mechanism
which leads us all
to a future that's frozen,
mechanical, inconsiderate,
of computers and machines
sophisticated bombs
and pilotless planes
But you, keep for me your body
and your hair
keep for me your breath
close, close to my face
keep for me your eyes
and the smell of your skin.
Keep for me this pure corner,
the last in the world:
give me
give me your smile
That is all I can give you now
And you won’t want me this way.
Will you want me?
-Ron Adler