By Carla Sofia Ferreira Fernandes
Talhadas, the home village of the poem’s main character which he left in the 1950s to return to only twenty years later. Photo Credit: Carla Sofia Ferreira Fernandes.
1950s, one way ticket to cross the Atlantic
Promises and dreams, hopes and fears
Leaving behind all that he thought was his
Warm ocean waters, new food and scents
Endless summers in that tropical land
Working long hours, his new life began
Friends with different accents
People from other shores
Some had never seen money before
And then the radio announced the rain
Where some of his friends were from
After a drought so painfully long
Immediately they headed home
Rushing to celebrate the new rain
And that they could live there once again
They left my father, still by the ocean
Waiting patiently for good news to come
From the place he always called home
Carla Sofia Ferreira Fernandes is a former humanitarian worker who currently conducts research on climate-induced migration in Morocco, as part of the PhD programme in Social Sustainability and Development of Universidade Aberta, Portugal, and in collaboration with the research group Societies and Environmental Sustainability of the Centre for Functional Ecology, Coimbra, Portugal.