Let's cooperate and liberate the world
from humanists and believers
because they do not believe
in mighty people

but in justice
Let's cooperate and free the world
Let money rule without borders
of virtue and let us cooperate

to make more power with a profit
See the foreigners on heaven's
edges look enviously over the fence
at us conquerors of the world

Let them look, they are not coming in!
We buy us safe and free, we don't have
to pray anxiously for our possessions
like small bosses, farmers and citizens

Because we shift the risks
We can count on poor people
the mercenaries of having nothing
to lose than their lives

My thoughts cry
at seeing and hearing the people
on terraces, the ferry and the news

I cry for wars that are never over
for the survivors and the witnesses around
the corner, who lived past the violence
and have not seen any dead people

that are also not over for their children
immaculate, innocent, naive
who claim
heaven on earth

which fails to happen, even though
those people shout toughly afraid
how great their heroes are
their nation, their past and future

and they shout who does not belong
who must leave
their right
or be held back

with fences and the hard way
of guns and starvation
in no-man's-land

I'm back, on my guard
in the streets of my youth
and the crying embrace

of amma and my sisters
on the banks where I've played
I won't leave here again

even if I have to fight for it
It is not in my hand
to die or to kill

No longer can I be an exile
a polite guest conforming
like a slave

I'm back, on my guard
in my own house, and you, brother
the oldest, you must be wiser

No king
can crown himself
at most he can be a servant

Just let them reason, get their right
in words as if we are talking

about the same, yes just let them
shoot, the State will not give in

to violence, blood does not write
evidence, only facts

reveal truth:
foreigners and relatives besiege

us, they yell threats
and demands, forsake peace

But we've got nothing to lose
we have everything, victory

or heaven, and they will be forgotten
not even mocked for their foolishness

of coming to kill us in their delusion
to be happy afterwards. Like cadavers

after slaughter, they will lie in the field
eaten by hyenas, jackals, rats

and worms from the underworld
Children will play with the bones

Do the right thing, though I don't want to
kill and be killed, but still
drive out tyranny for others

If that is the limit of my life
I can't go any further, and I don't want to
be confined to it

Who else could I be?
Because this lack of freedom I don't want
for those who are still young

So I renounce what I want
to withstand and I do what I want
to bequeath. I don't hold my tongue!

In my darkest clothes I slink
home from the front at night
stooping along the walls
of the cemetery, crawling
through the ditch around the checkpoint

Mama cries
and pushes me to the rear
to the raked bed
of tulips under the jasmine
where there is some kind of peace

I have to
do what I should do
just like my brother, who lies here
in our secret bosom
because he dared to speak about peace

when neighbouring villagers came
shouting from the barrel of a tank
that we should step aside
for their protection in the name
of the Supreme and the government

Being a volcano
with a thick skin
of fresh fertile soil

Wasting myself on it
with well-intentioned tinkering
and failing plans

Ignore the mess
It's not that bad
Excuses are unnecessary

Tomorrow is another day
for the holy got to be
and new wrongprovements

There's enough in bloom
to live on
between all solidifications and ashes -

the black of ardent ideals

There is nothing more beautiful than the green
of palms after a long journey
through the desert, fresh water
and a shelter from the sun
But the people

watch you, it's all boredom
trapped between thick walls
(Everything better than the streets
  that stink of cattle and shit
  The flies lick your eyes)

There is nothing more beautiful than the colours
of silk and gems on the body
of a handsome woman, pearls and perfume
in her clothes, between her breasts
so that the people

watch you and your husband
spoils you with desire
grapes and sweet cakes
It is a lovely dream
that it will not pass

The war had started
with a quarrel beginning small
but not knowing how to stop
and honour, stubbornness, resentment
the destructiveness of men

Far from the turmoil of battle
the big countries are meeting
on the round top of the Olympus
they drink nectar and look away
in the distance how to proceed

The rich cities are pathetic
they pity the humans
lying one by one
in the dust, but the sun is shining
and says: let them fight it out for themselves

One supports one
the other supports the other
each holds his position
and evilly hatches plans
waiting for the dark

pondering about secret actions
telling to be the wisest
looking ahead further and
giving advice in the field
to speed up the end

I know the books of wisdom
and the rules how to live
without idols, yet modest

I know: a king does matter
he makes proud and servile
he sits on a throne of violence

I know: failure divides
nationalists in zealots
and dreamers, licking

their bitterness behind walls
of obdurate hope, dissatisfied
with a good life, yes I know

For 1000 years they've been fighting
in the name of the Force
of their desire

to enjoy princely
ignoring that peace is not free
and that there are no inhuman people

only people who pay the price
who know the words
and believe

in action

The zealots fight harder and harder
for their own state, own country
against the loss of their stories

Their frustration memory
the doom image of anonymously
and dispersed over the earth

having a good life
but not being chosen
and still not free

of strangers, their incomprehension
and selective envy and
above all the past

that obliges them under penalty
of loss of flag, loss of identity and of
everything that should cover the cargo

The cruelty from heaven
The far-flung death
The finally acquired land

and the permanent salvation
from the itinerant existence
of Nahor, Terah, Abram

and the daughters of the daughters
of the daughters of the daughters
of his daughters

I came down from the Arafat
and could not reach the city
I encountered three walls

built of reason, that fruit
from the tree of knowledge
that tempting serpent

with the bad name
Devil
the devil who spoke

to Eve: do it, eat
and to Abraham: don't do it
don't sacrifice your son

who made his wife and son
rebellious
to stop him

but Abraham gathered stones
and chased away their words
which he already knew

from his own thoughts
that were too devout
for his reason

Seven times
seven times
he threw

I walk through the village
The sun shines, the wind blows
a little through my hair

The shutters are closed
with chinks thin as needles
with long narrow eyes

My shadow doesn't fall inside
anywhere, there are none
in the dim rooms

where the light drearily
obscures what is going on
and what the consequences are

of everyone's comings and goings
The peeping people press me
as compelling devils

out of their eyes
out of the chinks in their lives
The sun upon me is insufferable

It was a day without a date
an ordinary day, as far as we know

no grand prince was born
no city perished or world empire collapsed

It is very long ago, that day
of the black stone rain

It may have been a harsh punishment
although no one knew what for

certainly not later, so what else
could it have been

but a heavenly gift?
The small stones fell apart

but a large one remains
as a reminder

of the regained island
without its walls lost

as paradise, but a promise
to the faithful: one day

another day without a date
will be the last and the first

Sometimes I feel I miss something:

the world of the book I finished
chances I seemed to have
unrealized plans

desires that do not pass
or my courage ducking
behind practical objections

Then I want a world of my own
to be special, or beautiful
with people who listen to me

but people don't do that
and that is sad, just as sad
as being common in common clothes

and being not so beautiful
obliged to live
in a not so beautiful world

Believing in a new world
for our children's children
and able to wait a long time

making plans
for the divine time
which now begins, with plan A, B, C

and D for Door
to the future
of a Holy Land

with reinforced concrete
and faits accomplis
house by house

field after field, well after well
plundered, contaminated or closed
military area, the dogs loose

at children herding goats
children going to school
children of blind and crippled people
children without parents
children who shouldn't be here

For keeps, the mountain is caught
in the stranglehold of the snake
and the city too, the whole country

Along the sea, its tail lashes
with thunders, craters of hellfire
into the earth, it roars and howls

fears of death into our breath at night
it shatters our grasshopper heads
on the cobblestones, each and every one

It doesn't like me, it only eats
the land on which I live, it encloses
and stuns me like a cockroach
that keeps sliding back in the bottle

and cannot escape from dreams
of lost freedom and the villages
wiped away and smoothed
by its long snake stomach

There is no land left for the dead
They are buried under our beds
Tell me, how can I sleep like this
waiting for a miracle
waiting for death?

The earth is a thin shell
around glinting hot
stardust, fertile
rotating space pumice

metabolized by cold
and the warmth of the sun
friction and volcanoes
yotta's of parasites

Bosses and bankers
place your bets
with dynamite and diamond
drills, really

it's nobody's fault when it goes wrong
Perhaps there is a higher will

We don't have to ask ourselves
how it would deal with it

because we know the answer
within living memory: due to
providence it would
go the way it goes

It is windless
Plastic water
Dinner with mama

I linger at the crossroads
on the way home
My rooms are so empty

and you live nearby
I can go to you
and yet I can't

Behind the thin curtains
is the street, the city, alive
Nobody sees me

I'd like to read love letters
from you, confessions
that you never wrote to me

I keep thinking about that
waiting for sleep, lying still
like a plastic doll

There is no thin part
in the hedge around my life
I have to push through it

My horns get entangled
Where is the helping hand
when you need it?

Should I die here
like Moses on the holy mountain
looking out over the promised land?

Heaven, save me the earth
of a premature grave, give wind
that bends away the branches, water
that exposes the roots, or fire

and I will endure it
until the wood is dry and will give way
If necessary, break off my horns
just do something, and love me

It itches in my head
the world turns and tumbles
on margins

of prestige and laws
and well-known artists
dance along

they want to make
something for thousands
of years, for everyone

an axis of eternal truth
and beauty, protected
from the own laws

of vandals, the army
of black beetles
on bomberdumberdays

the violence of time
in the margin of which people
potter for immortality

The word has been indestructibly
poured, swept and guarded
it has leveled pimples and polyps
of boulders and trees
straightened noses and washed ears

with rules and shame
because no one should get lost
there is no more room for it
in the Street of the People

for the Book of Changes
teaches that
nothing can be done
in case of dissension

The word has become sugary-sweet
daily a pill against boredom, it has become
supervision and volcanic concrete
one sauce for goose and gander
it lives among us

To the south the gardens are empty
the Butterfly People live in the north and there
are also Tibetan museums with explanations
in the colours of the new era

because the word is for everyone
and except for those close to you
everyone is everyone to everyone
Everyone is everyone

Sometimes I dream of a new start
a new world, the earth
without human vices

only divine births
of helpfulness and wisdom
so that those words become obsolete

finally no more auditions
of imaginary comedians
with endless filth

their bundling of centuries
of coercion, humiliation, and abuse
in the joke of The Aristocrats

A world without me
only plants, animals
and avatars as a kind

of people who walk the virtual reality
of the golden means
of Aristotle

The Old Man of the Mountain
teaches his wisdom
in the libraries

and the beautiful gardens
where, along wide paths
plants are always in bloom

At harvest time
the branches hang low
full of delicious fruits

Young women in light robes
tend the garden and the tables
where they serve the boys

with food, drink, and blissful kisses
all over their body, heavenly
as they say, it is there

as awaits them
if they follow the way, yes
they fancy they are there already

so spacious are their heads
from the resin in the biscuits
that death attracts them

The Knitting Needles Museum
has a prudish name
that frightens the schoolchildren
and obscures the oppression
of desperate and raped women

The torture museum
and the war museum also
lack the inspiration
from a muse
They are monuments

and should be called that
With the unbuilt museums
of destroyed art and
ancient cultures, they can
fill a street in any city

Ecce homo, behold man
the noble beast, the master
of things and nothings -
virtual and vanished
worlds that are unlivable

Here, on the fertile shores
of the crescent moon
we have a good life
We can make a start

draw borders
build a state
recruit boys and train them
to be border guards

We pay them well
That attracts girls
There is money for extra
children

boys
who don't have to work
in the fields or in town
but can become soldiers

and girls
to care for them
and to serve them, at home
where their place is

within the boundaries
of their husband's state
who serves the country's state
his paternal home

under our leadership
the hard way of the state
in which the tasks are split up
No more equality

After the ritual you were healthy
but the medicine
made you burn again
Do you feel nauseous?

If only you had listened to me
He can't help it either
he needs those ice pops
against the ulcers in his mouth

Don't forget to buy batteries
and tomorrow you have to do it
like me, especially the bathroom
and don't put anything exactly in its place

then it will be clear
that you have cleaned
Oh this misery
all the noise

wet bedding
high deposit
and your family
isn't helping

Flowers and insects, so many are gone
     Lives pass away, it is easy to see
Stop it, don't do it, don't let it go on
     Foreigners, friends, all our family, we

Businesses stop and employments will end
     Lives pass away, it is easy to see
Borders and shops being closed, it's a trend
     Foreigners, friends, all our family, we

All of us know, don't you see, don't you sense it?
     Lives pass away, it is easy to see
When are we willing, when shall we commit?
     Foreigners, friends, all our family, we

People who flee, many starve, many drown
     Lives pass away, it is easy to see
Peoples and nations come up and go down
     Foreigners, friends, all our family, we

Angels and trumpets are still on the loose
     Lives pass away, it is easy to see
Shall we count down, or say bo to a goose?
     Foreigners, friends, all our family, we

Judges weigh accomplished facts
   (against justice)
boards weigh costs and benefits
   (against set goals)
and representatives
   weigh desires and greed
   (against peace and prosperity)

They must work together
listen and talk things over
esteem no one less or more
than themselves

but chosen they are
a mirror of the voters
divided, and a partial
interest is easier

   (with distorted scales
     false weights and
     the stories that owners
     write behind the scenes
     to rationalise their theft)
to promote than a long-
term general interest

What are you actually capable of?
I have no use for you at all
You have grown old, dirty
and you have no one
to look after you, so

you can tell
I'm tired of you
Get out of here
or I'll cause you something
It is your own fault

You know the way it goes
what you are worth, that
it can't go on like this
Don't just sit there
hoping this will pass

I don't want to see you anymore
You'd better be happy
so patient I've been with you
And now it's time for tea
I'll make it myself today

I came here to keep the peace
but I am waiting for nothing
watching nothing

and recording it
in the logs
of the writing angels

with their sky-blue helmets
powerless against the thirst for blood
and nauseous from the smell

of the vomit in my mouth
while the ambulances sneak away
and the city is sprayed clean

Even the most beautiful girls
cannot keep our sons at home
     We only know half
     of their dreams, not the other
     half that will not come true

Oh, girls (poor girls)
will they take over there
     Without obligations
     and without resistance
     Struggling bleeds dead

They spit on their worker's hands
look forward to striking fists
     Peace is not their world
     They are no longer children
     and they laugh at our worries

On our breasts we fed them
with peace
     They have grown from it
     developing in homeliness
     but now they want something else

Deep into the night
they felt like winners
The blood had flowed
and it was not theirs

But at dawn
the corpses lay down
with the frightened women
and crying children

in their heads
Occupied, nothing wants to
flow in their bodies
Betrayal! Betrayal!

Ghosts and rats
lick the anger
and play hide and seek
in the maze of lies

about the heroic battle
for the fatherland
and its powerful fathers
with their forked tongue

Under the Peace Flag
there is the most freedom
to continue the war
referring to provisions
in the Treaty of Peace

There is always a story
to tell about the past
an era to choose
in which is founded
what was lost, a Golden Age

to which the people are entitled
and in which they will arise:
everything will be fine
as long as you have the last word
and silence the dissenters

those traitors of the truth
and the ideals of the revolution
Fight for equal rights
of our oppressed brothers
Free them!

Restore the territory
the foundation of the wealth
and the power of the leaders
then they might grant you
a large statue