Land of the albatross, land of
love
Graceful albatross couple, gives birth to their innocent offspring
In a land where the sea and the wind fill the heart
Generations of albatross made these islands their home
Unaware of maps, history and the desolation of futile wars
Fruit of love, a small child with light blue eyes is born
Its first words evoke Celtic lands and language
Generation after generation, they laugh and cry together
Blind to the world, isolated in their land, they live their moment
A kiss of love, to another little person gives birth, brown its eyes
Whose first Castilian words, breathe warmth into a new continent
Immigrant stories, ancestral suffering, dreams of a future
Unaware of the sad fate others with small minds are plotting
Tresses of ebony interlace, generate a tiny being, black its eyes
Its first sounds echo a free and wild land
Original race, a land blessed by ancestors, slowly conquered
Hurt became the “new” lands, yet lands of the “old” language
It is the story of those who were here, those who came later, of those who remained
Stories of peoples, the union of cultures and dreams in small geography
The land is from nobody, the land is from everybody, it is the blending of
hearts
Through respect, mutual help and shared growth, the love between peoples creates
space for joy
There was a time when the albatross and other creatures lived together in
harmony in the islands
There were no misunderstandings, the flight of the albatross freed all to
dream
Generations, races, colours, stories, these were the fruits of a shared
soil
But the horror of the war stunned all, even the albatross, who ceased his
flight
Someone forced them to turn
harmony into hate
Disrupted the blending of
different cultures from its natural evolution
That sons would mourn their
fathers, such cruel and painful bereavement
Such that to be island or
continent was an insult, a symbol of separation
I would like to believe that
we learnt something from the suffering
That life offers us wiser and more
luminous ways
That no land justifies the
death of some
And that sharing is the way to
heal wounds, the way to dissolve hatred
I would like to believe that
the albatross will fly again, free and enamoured
That new generations will
repair the damage caused by those who knew not how to love
That the colors of the flags will blend into a rainbow of hope
That the tears of different tongues will merge in the waves of the ocean
At the end this is our longing, and without doubt we always knew it
That to honour the suffering, we need to embrace our different hues
To return to the birds their free sky and to the islands their joy
To these precious islands, land of the albatross, land of love
Bariloche 27th March 2012, dreaming of a future of love for the Falkland
Islands
(1982-2012)
A special thanks for my dearest friend Ian Bullock (UK), one of the finest naturalists that I have encountered, who helped me in translating this poem. Ian and myself are a good example of the good friendship that can exist between a Britt and an Argentinean, sharing their love for nature and for the Islands.
A special thanks for my dearest friend Ian Bullock (UK), one of the finest naturalists that I have encountered, who helped me in translating this poem. Ian and myself are a good example of the good friendship that can exist between a Britt and an Argentinean, sharing their love for nature and for the Islands.
Un especial agradecimiento para mi querido
amigo Ian Bullock (UK), uno de los naturalistas más finos que he conocido,
quien me ayudara a traducir este poema. Ian y yo somos un buen ejemplo de la
hermosa amistad que puede existir entre un Británico y un Argentino,
compartiendo nuestro amor por la naturaleza y por las Islas
