ABOUT YOUR HANDS AND LIES
Your hands grave like all stones,
sad like all songs sung in prison,
clumsy and heavy like all beasts of burden,
your hands that are like the sullen faces of hungry children.
Your hands nimble and light like bees,
full like breasts with milk, brave like nature,
your hands that hide their friendly softness
under their rough skin.
This world doesn't rest on the horns of a bull,
this world rests on your hands.
People, oh my people, they feed you with lies.
But you're hungry, you need to be fed meat and bread.
And never once eating a full meal at a white table,
you leave this world where every branch is loaded with fruit.
Oh my people, especially those in Asia, Africa,
the Near East, Middle East, Pacific Islands
and my countrymen--
I mean, more than seventy percent of all people--
you are old and absent-minded like your hands,
you are curious, amazed, and young like your hands.
Oh my people,
my European, my American,
you are awake, bold, and forgetful like your hands,
like your hands you're quick to seduce,
easy to deceive . . .
People, oh my people,
if the antennas are lying,
if the presses are lying,
if the books lie,
if the poster on the wall and the ad in the column lie,
if the naked thighs of girls on the white screen lie,
if the prayer lies,
if the lullaby lies,
if the dream is lying,
if the violin player at the tavern is lying,
if the moonlight on the nights of hopeless days lies,
if the voice lies,
if the word lies,
if everything but your hands,
if everyone, is lying,
it's so your hands will be obedient like clay,
blind like darkness,
stupid like sheep dogs,
it's so your hands won't rebel.
And it's so that in this mortal, this livable world
--where we are guests so briefly anyway--
this merchant's empire, this cruelty, won't end.
1949
--Nazim Hikmet
Translated from the Turkish by Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk.
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