WHEN MEMORY BECAME A CRIME

what you removed remained in me what you forbade returned in sound the paper emptied in your hands but absence gathered weight around i kept the missing in my voice one breath beyond your sealed design you built a law against recall and memory became a crime Lex iubet oblivisci Memoria vetita Quod deletum est, taceat Nullus testis maneat they cut the dates from every wall removed each face from every frame rewrote the census line by line then swore that no one ever came the houses kept their measured dust the cups remained, the beds were warm but every ledger closed its mouth before the clerks declared reform but memory is not a document no seal can govern what i saw it lives beneath the practiced speech beyond the reach of written law when memory became a crime i held the missing in my voice you changed the dates and sealed the doors the empty chairs refused your lie when memory became a crime i learned what paper cannot keep every life you tried to erase returned each time i dared to speak Помним ви Вие бяхте тук what you removed remained in me what you forbade returned in sound a record may be made to vanish the body keeps what ink denies they painted over children’s marks still faintly rising by the door sold every coat before the thaw then counted no one there before a clerk inspected vacant rooms and called the stripped foundations clean but floorboards kept the weight of feet and plaster held what they had seen no archive owns what i remember no seal can govern what i saw the more you order me to lose them the more precisely i recall when memory became a crime i held the missing in my voice you changed the dates and sealed the doors the empty chairs refused your lie when memory became a crime i learned what paper cannot keep every life you tried to erase returned each time i dared to speak Memoria vetita Nullus testis maneat Не сте изчезнали Паметта остава i cannot give them back their hours i cannot mend the severed years i can refuse your final sentence and keep their human measure near Помним ви Вие бяхте тук Не сте изчезнали Паметта остава you remain... when memory became a crime we held the missing in our voice you changed the dates and sealed the doors the empty chairs refused your lie when memory became a crime your perfect record came apart every life you tried to erase returned through a thousand throats Memoria non moritur Паметта остава when memory became a crime... the crime was never memory the crime was your command to lose i kept one breath beyond your reach now it returns through all of us