When your soul returns to Ras Dashen many years from now,

Time will stop to acknowledge your final descent.

Time will give no pardon.  Time will take no vow.

As a child again, you will walk through the land.

At the mountain foot olive trees are the same;

They were guarding your peace from below and above.

When the world seemed unfair – this is where you came,

This is where you dreamed of your very first love.

Food was bland on the way and the colors were wrong;

You were picking your heart piece by piece from the ground,

Cell by cell coming back to the place you belong...

No irony, but life is like “lost and found.”

Chains of memories visit your bed every night.

Blind shadows dance, make a feast on the floor;

They are happy to see that you aren’t satisfied –

Every morning you’re thirsty and begging for more.

How many sunsets and sunrises you missed,

When you traveled alone seeking answers and reasons?

You would give half a life for the mountain mist,

For its rains, for its stars, for its changes of seasons. 

You crossed cultures and borders a thousand times

Justifying the reasons for which you were born.

There are no ovations, but an echo of chimes,

At the mountain side when the souls return…