Mihael Gudovskih — Когда вырастут дети

We gave everything — and what is left for us? We warmed their palms through the nights When the fever was forty and fear. We gathered their fate crumb by crumb, Forgetting ourselves in other people's dreams. We saved — for their future, Leaving ourselves «sometime later». And we believed: they'll grow up — it will be better, And they won't forget us somehow, somehow someone will.

And when the children grow up — They suddenly become strangers. We gave them all the light, And got an empty sound. Where are you, our dear ones? Who are you to us now? We were the whole world for you, And you forgot in an hour?

Father was silent, but breaking inside, When there wasn't enough for bread and warmth. Mother smiled through her tears, So the children would think — all is well. We didn't ask them to repay our debts, We didn't count who gave how much. But why now, in the silence, Even a call feels like a stranger's signal?

We don't need money — we need a native voice, We don't need gifts — just a «how are you». But you choose a world of your own that's foreign, Where there's no room left for the old family.

And when the children grow up — They sometimes won't remember Who held this world over their heads. And only the old walls Remember everything to the end: How mother waits by the window, How quietly father grows old.