prodigal daughter
by Sophia Armen
prod·i·gal
/ˈprädəɡəl/
adjective
adjective: prodigal
spending money or resources freely and recklessly; wastefully extravagant.
"prodigal habits die hard"
and when the fields get dew kisses in the morning, bacheegner
my father waits for me on the ridge
But I do not come
Reckless bequest use the wreckage of an already sinking ship
the selfishness, the greed, the envy
the trappings of the West, built atop silenced bones and lynchings and bombs
it’s selfishness, it’s greed
it’s envy
why do you wait for me father
The one who has lost her land
And lost her tongue
And they say when they found her already her head was long gone
left from the killing fields of Van’s martyrs
fathers emerge
and don’t
You, merciful
Me, an angel of wrath and death
Lost when the wave crashed
And splintered us out into the water
covered four corners of earth
that was sphere, and leaps and bounds and
now we wait in limbo
diaspora
for no return
Now we wait for State sanctioned benchmarks
To rebuild what was lost
they say, but maybe not
what is a daughter who was almost vanished
with a nation, but the welcome though painful
is promised
Forgive me, fatherland
i have returned and I’ll never go back out to sea
i beg for your mercy
for I was lost
and now I am found,
you found me
Sophia Armen is an organizer and writer from Los Angeles, CA. She can be found at @diasporandaughter and @sophiaarmen