Forced Deportations

by Sofia Kontogeorge Kostos

They did not know why.
Forced to walk without food without water
Forced to walk from where they once dwelled

They could not hide:
Forced to walk without shelter
Forced to walk into scorching sun, malarial swamps, and biting snow

They agonized until they died:
Forced deportations of fathers, mothers, all
Forced to walk till their footprints vanished.

Source: Sarafian, Ara (ed.), Forgotten Genocides of the 20th Century, Taderon Press, London and Reading, p. 64.