How are you, Mom? We haven’t talked
for so long—I haven’t received any news
from you, but there are signs that I decipher
like your tracks, like a greeting from you.
You promised me that you would come
and death would never separate us.
All my days have been transformed
into a waiting with quick beats of my heart.
Mother, I cannot come to you just now,
as hundreds of sleepy verses wait for me,
a lot of vague and confused ideas to be
changed on a sheet of paper into poetries.
Our memories often come to my mind:
our tiny kitchen and those dark nights,
the long evenings around a small stove
that were kindled by affection and love.
You knew how to keep your promises,
so I fear that something has happened.
I’ll send a letter to you in your shelter,
cooled beneath the cypress tree shade.