They, the committee, will arrange it all
even pay for the airfare,
yet I haven’t the courage to go back to the country
I left so many years ago
that leaving Portugal, my adopted country
feels like going into exile.
Much time will be spent visiting graves of those I loved
walking streets full of windows with pretty curtains
and sills of potted flowers
that will sternly castigate me with their Nordic domesticity.
Faces that were young when I left,
are now old and I will not remember
unless they tell me their names and I will say:
“How are you, long time no see”
Worst of all what if they stop me at the airport
when going back to Portugal saying:
“Sorry mate you can’t go, you are too old now.”