A Song To My Son
Do not call me, father dear. Do not seek me.
Do not call me, do not wish me back.
We're on a route uncharted,
fire and blood erase our track.
On we fly, on wings of thunder,
nevermore to sheath our swords.
All of us in battles fallen,
not to be brought back by words.
Will there be a rendezvous?
I know not.
I only know we still must fight.
We are sand grains in infinity,
never to meet, nevermore see light.
Farewell then my son, farewell then my conscience,
my youth and my solace, my one and my only.
And let this farewell be the end of the story,
a solitude vast in which none is more lonely.
In which you remain barred, forever and ever,
from light and from air with your death pangs untold.
Untold and unproved, not to be resurrected --
forever and ever, an eighteen year old.
Farewell then. No trains ever come from those regions,
unscheduled or scheduled. No airplanes fly there.
Farewell then my son, for no miracles happen,
as in this world, dreams do not come true.
Farewell.
I will dream of you still as a baby,
treading the earth with little strong toes.
The earth where so many already lie buried.
This song to my son, then, has come to its close.
-- Anonymous Englishman, 1944