If This Is a Man

	You who live safe
	In your warm houses,
	You who find, returning in the evening,
	Hot food and friendly faces:
	Consider if this is a man
	Who works in the mud
	Who does not know peace
	Who fights for a scrap of bread
	Who dies because of a yes or a no.
	Consider if this is a woman,
	Without hair and without name
	With no more strength to remember,
	Her eyes empty and her womb cold
	Like a frog in winter.
	Meditate that this came about:
	I commend these words to you.
	Carve them in your hearts
	At home, in the street,
	Going to bed, rising;
	Repeat them to your children,
	Or may your house fall apart,
	May illness impede you,
	May your children turn their faces from you.