world wide reading

This is a call for a world wide reading launched by the berlin literatur festival

We ask all of you to read this poem and to let us know through a comment where the poem was read.

Thanks for all you do for Freedom of Expression and the writers in prison because of their writings..

You Wait for Me with Dust

- for my wife, who waits every day

by Liu Xiaobo

.

nothing remains in your name, nothing

but to wait for me, together with the dust of our home 

those layers 

amassed, overflowing, in every corner 

you're unwilling to pull apart the curtains

and let the light disturb their stillness

over the bookshelf, the handwritten label is covered in dust

on the carpet the pattern inhales the dust

when you are writing a letter to me 

and love that the nib’s tipped with dust

my eyes are stabbed with pain

you sit there all day long 

not daring to move 

for fear that your footsteps will trample the dust 

you try to control your breathing 

using silence to write a story. 

At times like this 

the suffocating dust offers the only loyalty

your vision, breath and time

permeate the dust 

in the depth of your soul 

the tomb inch by inch is 

piled up from the feet

reaching the chest 

reaching the throat

you know that the tomb 

is your best resting place 

waiting for me there 

with no source of fear or alarm 

this is why you prefer dust

in the dark, in calm suffocation 

waiting, waiting for me 

you wait for me with dust

refusing the sunlight and movement of air 

just let the dust bury you altogether 

just let yourself fall asleep in the dust

until I return

and you come awake 

wiping the dust from your skin and your soul.

What a miracle – back from the dead. 

April 9th 1999