Venice masks

Monday, 27 April 2026

Why do you look like them? - Victoria Amelina

Why do you look like them?
Maybe you are brothers?

No, our hands intertwined 
not in a hug, but in a fight
Our blood was mixed with the soil
they took our harvest from
Our eyes cried with tears
that turned into ice
behind the gates of our warm cities
we were thrown out

Our language was burned alive
screaming on the Maidan
And we picked up the foreign one
as if someone else's gun
We learned from the books of our captors
all the paths in the prison labyrinth

Our mother cursed us
to look like the murderers
not like our killed father
So we would die not in a slaughterhouse
but in the fight

So, when our fight begins
Don't ask us 
Why do we look like those
who have been killing us for so long

Victoria Amelina (1986 - 2023) Ukraine
Translated by Darya Zorka
Source: From My Heart

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