Poetry
Pleading Guilty
I avoid you, Elsewhere!
I am not there and age can be a good excuse
for something one can’t bear –
I listen to birds chirp
protest at trees chopped down
and stone erected here where you are not.
It’s almost winter
but climate change ignores the months –
I worry how it will treat my children and their children
only eventually
I wonder only abstractly what they’ll learn of history and of blood
while those of others are bombed.
Walking in sunshine or snug indoors
I avoid you
and relegate you to the safe box I can switch off,
Maria Grech Ganado
Maria Grech Ganado (b.1943) has won National Book Prizes for 4 of her 8 poetry collections in Maltese or English, has been published in English in the USA, UK, Australia and Cyprus, as well as in translation to 15 other languages. In 2005 she coorganised an international seminar (RE-VISIONS) with LAF (Literature Across Frontiers) and Inizjamed in Malta. She has been awarded by the State, the University of Malta and her hometown, Floriana. Maria has 3 children and 3 grandchildren.