Counting on ... and on ... BLACK LIVES MATTER!

     In these days of learning to recognize the racism and racial injustice that has gone on in the United States for SO LONG I am reminded of a poem, "Learning to Count" by Romanian poet Nichita Stanescu (1933-1983) (posted at this link back in 2011), a poem that captures the horror of barbarianism.

     Learning to count     by Nichita Stanescu                   
                        
     Hairy and sweaty sit                            
     the barbarian Hittites.       
     Learning to count they pull from corpses
     fingers, legs, arms, eyes.                                    
     Oh, divided ones,    
     how bloody              
     is the idea of having ideas!  
     Hairy and sweaty sit                             
     the grand Hittites, grandly —
     from corpses they pull a finger, a leg:  
     eight, says one,                    
     four, says another.                                              
     They are learning to count.

     The translation from the Romanian was prepared by Gabriel Prajitura and JoAnne Growney.  The original poem in Romanian is available here.  IT IS MY HOPE that we can learn to recognize and eliminate hate and discrimination and create justice for all.

This link leads to previous postings in this blog of work by Nichita Stanescu.