absinthe Absinthe: World Literature in Translation 2377-3456 1744 4_senocak-karuc.pdf 10.3998/absinthe.1744 Poetry Forgotten Journeys to the Past | I breathed by you | password world | at night every trip leads abroad | I could have stopped | Refugees run across the meadow Şenocak Zafer zafer.senocak@journal.com Karuç Özlem ozlem.karuc@journal.com 30 11 2021 27 Through German: Contemporary Literature in Translation CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 I breathed by you and the room suddenly became wide windows in front of my chest the eyes shut and in flight houses dangled below me on their ties and one room became two two words four then strife endless time and trembling walls one person borders on the other civilian life a continuation of war by other means how many words are four by four meters I calculated in my head and unlearned to divide the door goes there the window over there and a little more wind please onto the skin password world owner certificates for curbsides houses open and lock themselves passersby on the outskirts on leave fall over roaring living by the recreation area city falcons bred and released land on the windowsill and the gutter across at night every trip leads abroad an old man and a young woman two languages which moves away which returns home no word uttered on the way picture stories drive through the head the night train from the last century been on the run human beings driven into pits and back again under the heaven of the poor the train is on time at every border foreign lands turn into foreigners one speaks the other language who are you when you are among them an old man a young woman time without train stations would be the longest river On its route Unsecured roundish objects made of glass Above the heads could shatter I could have stopped understanding everyone I could have stopped thinking of tea at noon I could have stopped, in my room, thinking of the eggshells in the kitchen, their filling assisting the dough in the oven towards a new skin color I shouldn’t have forgotten that an official petition must be submitted for every change of skin color, which must be approved I should have smelled deadlines without thinking of them I could not have known that the formulation of an application was a morning prayer I should have heard the Father calling to prayer I should have given up idolizing sleep in my youthful negligence I should have written down all my laziness and my sins no longer to be remembered I should have known that by forgetting my house forfeits space and the only room I have left measures hardly more than a coffin I could have stopped I shouldn’t have been allowed to forget I should have known How it works To repent without begging for guilt Refugees run across the meadow in front of the school Straightening the kinked flower stems They do not want to be confused with truants With the last dilettante escape of the captured    Stop Halt! don’t you notice that we want to ride along Between the berry bushes red and blue Their stride assimilated they dare To go up to the vineyards    there the wood grouse pushed its call    into the morning breath between the full branches ripe and round daylight has broken