This was written when I was in Halifax, Nova Scotia and I was working alongside other new Canadians. One of the couples there were refugees from Bosnia. The lady’s husband told me that they had chosen to come to Halifax because his wife wanted to be able to touch the Atlantic as that way she felt she may still be connected to what was once her home.
I stand on the eastern most tip
And face the Atlantic
Grey tears on my face
Join the brine at the base
Of my feet
Home is somewhere
Far, over there
East of Europe
Abandoned by hope
And my heart
This grey-pebbled beach
Is as close as I can reach
To that part of the world
From which I was hurled
By their hands
The wind whips at me
Shrieking why can’t you see
Your home is here now
You are safe now
Fall on your knees!
But my heart’s in turmoil
With love for the soil
Of mere lines on a map
Now, ripped into scrap
By their arms
And yet I touch the Atlantic waves
Hoping some contact is made
Upon another shore
Where I stood once before
With different feet
Pleading with the tiny drops of water from here
To travel and tell the tiny grains of sand over there
That someone in Nova Scotia
Stands on this shore
And for no reason at all, still cares.
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Rohini Sunderam
A semi-retired advertising copywriter who is finally exploring the 'writer' within. Rohini has had articles published in the Globe & Mail and The Chronicle-Herald (NS) in Canada and The Statesman, Calcutta, India.She also has two blogs - one her own Fictionpals and the other The Clock Struck One, which she manages for her brother who had a stroke in 2007.
