whether you return from a war or from elsewhere
when it's an elsewhere
unimaginable to others
it is hard to come back

whether you return from a war or from elsewhere
when it's an elsewhere
which is nowhere
it is hard to come back
for everything in the house
has grown foreign
while we were in the elsewhere

whether you return from a war or from elsewhere
where you have conversed with death
it is hard to come back
and speak again to the living

whether you return from a war or from elsewhere
when you come back from over there
and must relearn
it is hard to return
having contemplated death with eyes wide open
it is hard to relearn
looking at the dull eyes of the living

.....charlotte delbo