Their Boots Crushed The Gypsy Violin
By Rasim Sejdić
Translated by A.Z. Foreman
Their boots crushed the Gypsy violin
all that remains is Gypsies' ash
the fire the smoke
rise heavenward.
They carted away the Roma
children they ripped from mothers
wives from husbands
they carted away the Roma.
Jasenovac* — packed with Roma
tied to cement pillars they can't budge
their hands and feet in heavy shackles
down to their knees in mud and sludge.
There in Jasenovac* remain
their bones as witness
to indict the works of inhumanity
Dawn breaks anew, the sun
warming the Roma as it has always done.
*Jasenovac was an extermination camp. Run by the Croatian Ustaše with the material support of the Third Reich, and later dubbed "the Auschwitz of the Balkans" it was one of the largest and most sadistically administrated of all death camps. Inmates consisted of ethnic Serbs, Roma, Jews, Bosnian and Croat Muslims and anti-fascist dissidents. Approximately 45–52,000 Serbs, 15-20,000 Roma, 12-25,000 Jews, and 5-12,000 Muslims were murdered there. Roma taken to the camp did not undergo selection, but were kept in open air in subsection III-C, before being brought to the killing-grounds of Gradina and Ustice for liquidation interspersed with forced labor. The Ustaše made killing them a sport, and used knives, mallets, pick-axes, saws and other implements to dismember, bludgeon, exsanguinate, and behead their victims.
The Original:
Gazisarde Romengi Violina
Rasim Sejdić
Gazisarde romengi violina
ačile ognjište romane
e jag o dimo
ando oblako vazdinjalo.
Idžarde e Romen
čavoren restavisarde pe datar
e romnjen pe romendar
idžarde e Romen.
Jasenovco perdo Roma
pangle pala betonse stubujra
pale lantsujra pe prne pe va
ando balto dzi ke cang.
Ačile ando Jasenovco
lenge kokala
te pricin, o nemanušengim djelima
zora vedro osvanisarda
i Romen o kam pre tatarda.
By Rasim Sejdić
Translated by A.Z. Foreman
Their boots crushed the Gypsy violin
all that remains is Gypsies' ash
the fire the smoke
rise heavenward.
They carted away the Roma
children they ripped from mothers
wives from husbands
they carted away the Roma.
Jasenovac* — packed with Roma
tied to cement pillars they can't budge
their hands and feet in heavy shackles
down to their knees in mud and sludge.
There in Jasenovac* remain
their bones as witness
to indict the works of inhumanity
Dawn breaks anew, the sun
warming the Roma as it has always done.
*Jasenovac was an extermination camp. Run by the Croatian Ustaše with the material support of the Third Reich, and later dubbed "the Auschwitz of the Balkans" it was one of the largest and most sadistically administrated of all death camps. Inmates consisted of ethnic Serbs, Roma, Jews, Bosnian and Croat Muslims and anti-fascist dissidents. Approximately 45–52,000 Serbs, 15-20,000 Roma, 12-25,000 Jews, and 5-12,000 Muslims were murdered there. Roma taken to the camp did not undergo selection, but were kept in open air in subsection III-C, before being brought to the killing-grounds of Gradina and Ustice for liquidation interspersed with forced labor. The Ustaše made killing them a sport, and used knives, mallets, pick-axes, saws and other implements to dismember, bludgeon, exsanguinate, and behead their victims.
The Original:
Gazisarde Romengi Violina
Rasim Sejdić
Gazisarde romengi violina
ačile ognjište romane
e jag o dimo
ando oblako vazdinjalo.
Idžarde e Romen
čavoren restavisarde pe datar
e romnjen pe romendar
idžarde e Romen.
Jasenovco perdo Roma
pangle pala betonse stubujra
pale lantsujra pe prne pe va
ando balto dzi ke cang.
Ačile ando Jasenovco
lenge kokala
te pricin, o nemanušengim djelima
zora vedro osvanisarda
i Romen o kam pre tatarda.
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