Obvious Song

I chose the shade of this tree
to rest from all I will do
while I am waiting for you.

One who waits and only waits
lives out a time of waiting in vain.

Therefore, while I wait for you,
I will work the fields, and
I will talk to the men.

My body burned by the sun, I will drench it in sweat;
my hand will become calloused hands,
my feet will learn the mystery of the paths,
my ears will hear more,
my eyes will see what they did not see before,
while I am waiting for you.

I won't await you only waiting,
for my waiting time is
a what-to-do time.

I will distrust those who shall come to tell me,
in whispers and cautiously,
"it is dangerous to act,"
"it is dangerous to speak,"
"it is dangerous to walk,"
"it is dangerous to wait, in the way you wait,"
for those ones refuse the joy of your coming.

I will distrust those too who shall come to tell me,
with easy words, that you have come,
for those ones, as they naively herald you,
will first betray you.

I will be preparing your arrival
as a gardener tends to the garden
for the rose that shall come in the spring.

Paulo Freire
Geneva, March 1971
from Ana Maria Araujo Freire's collection.