Russian Men Flee To Border With Intense Fear Poem by Bernedita Rosinha Pinto

And as you will run
you will not look back
you will seek your own survival
you will value your own existence;
you will have no choice
you will keep running wanting to escape
the war, the death and its wrath.

Have you for once looked
at those nights of moaning and mourning
across the border
as silently and loudly Ukrainians wept
for those they lost and missed
when the war and its fatalities
made them succumb to that brutal fate
which now you are trying to escape?

What is the worth of patriotism
if you cannot save your people?
what is the worth of your existence
if you cannot fight for your country?
Is freedom and escape more valuable
than your own family and home?

Was it not equally pathetic situation
for all those who perished on the other side
of the border of your country
that today you want to run a marathon
and get away from the clutches
of war and its consequences?

Keep courage in your heart and fight back
keep hope in your feet and dare
as duty expects you to confront and contest
just as your brothers fought as soldiers
to defend their country and its call.

So stay back and hold up unity
don't use weapons but your voices;
keep shouting and screaming
that war is not a child's play
and let the whole world hear you
and come to help you;
don't fear and choose to run.

That brotherhood is universal
which asks for solidarity
and never gives up on its promise
as a cry in unity is far more strengthening
than those many miles you will run
leaving others back home to face
the mercilessness of war and its crimes.