Web Design

Esther Cole, Frollop

Powered By

SauceOpen

Poetry

Expectation by Tony Zandavar

Instead of a small cage, the great men have made a great cage and named it detention.
Instead of a small bird, the great men have placed miserable human beings behind bars.
And instead of open doors, they have made great doors
Under lock and key with a chain.
Wait, wait years if necessary....
Not outside, but inside.
The lonely man looked around and thought to himself:
“Freedom is a stranger, life is meaningless.”
Then he closed his eyes and backed into his past.
He has been waiting years for deliverance.
Wait, wait years in uselessness, with unfulfilled
Desires if necessary.
And silently hide behind the barbed wire, hide, hide.
Without speaking, without moving, in uncertainty.
Wait, wait years, until the bars become rusty.
Wait if necessary, even when they are replaced
By new bars.
Don't touch the bars. It is a mortal sin.
Keep watching the series of endless fence. It is beautiful
In its shining regularity!
Wait, wait years if necessary, until you become a great man with a broken heart, crook back and empty mind.
Then you can cry gently, noiselessly.
Don't disturb your loneliness!
Above all, keep waiting for the great men's decision
It may take valuable time, but wait, it is necessary!
The puppet man opened his eyes and turned
His back on the bars and said to himself:
Wait, wait years for an ounce of peace and freedom...
It is necessary.
Wait, wait years for the dawn to come.
It is great policy.
It is necessary
Hear me telling you.
Take heed
You are dead
In pure desperation, the miserable man picked up a brush and painted a hen onto his loneliness.

Tony Zandavar is an Iranian poet. After 5 years of detention at Port Hedland and Baxter (Australia) he was released. He lives in Tasmania.
This poem was originally published in Another Country: Writers in Detention, Sydney Pen & Halstead Press, edited by Tom Keneally and Rosie Scott.