Visar Zhiti: Little prison, big prison

Little prison, big prison

Do you know the two brothers in prison?
There are also three brothers,
And a father and son.
There are also a grandfather and grandson in prison.
A father-in-law and a son-in-law,
A man and his wife,
(His love languishes in the women's ward
Over hair shorn,
             like a blackbird
With wings clipped that it not soar).
There is also a family in prison,
All together
They've been sentenced to over a century.
Be steadfast!
Our whole country is a prison,
Draped in barbed wire,
Sentenced to three thousand years. Before Christ.
Our little prison
In the belly of a big prison
Is like a baby in the pouch
Of a crazed kangaroo.
You may despair,
But be steadfast!

(Visar Zhiti, Hedh një kafkë, translated by Robert Elsie)