Tuesday, 27 May 2014

Refugee blues, by W. H. Auden



                            Say this city has ten million souls,
                            Some are living in mansions, some are living in holes:
                            Yet there's no place for us, my dear, yet there's no place for us.


                            Once we had a country and we thought it fair,
                            Look in the atlas and you'll find it there:
                            We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now.

 
                            In the village churchyard there grows an old yew,
                            Every spring it blossoms anew;
                            Old passports can't do that, my dear, old passports can't do that.


                            The consul banged the table and said:
                            'If you've got no passport, you're officially dead';
                            But we are still alive, my dear, but we are still alive.


                            Went to a committee; they offered me a chair;
                            Asked me politely to return next year:
                            But where shall we go today, my dear, but where shall we go today?


                            Came to a public meeting; the speaker got up and said:
                            'If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread';
                            He was talking of you and me, my dear, he was talking of you and me.


                            Thought I heard the thunder rumbling in the sky;
                            It was Hitler over Europe, saying: 'They must die';
                            We were in his mind, my dear, we were in his mind.


                            Saw a poodle in a jacket fastened with a pin, 
                            Saw a door opened and a cat let in: 
                            But they weren't German Jews, my dear, but they weren't German Jews.

                            Went down the harbour and stood upon the quay,
                            Saw the fish swimming as if they were free:
                            Only ten feet away, my dear, only ten feet away.


                            Walked through a wood, saw the birds in the trees;
                            They had no politicians and sang at their ease:
                            They weren't the human race, my dear, they weren't the human race.


                            Dreamed I saw a building with a thousand floors,
                            A thousand windows and a thousand doors;
                            Not one of them was ours, my dear, not one of them was ours.


                            Stood on a great plain in the falling snow;
                            Ten thousand soldiers marched to and fro:
                            Looking for you and me, my dear, looking for you and me.




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