The river's flow cannot be halted easily
and the one who holds on to it’s stream
is not lost at least until it reaches the sea.
But to go against the austere flow
is only the way of remembrance
of things best left to forget.
Even to throw oneself into the water,
expecting it to enclose the sinking feeling
and freeze it by the cold,
leads only to a loss of the ability
to set one’s own pace,
to forfeit rest and sanity
in an unequal exchange
of ice shard for free will.

Yes, it happens sometimes
that the river might seem broken,
forgotten and conquered by the bridges,
infected with small ships and big boats,
or the heat of the august sun might
dry up and hollowed out its bank.
But the world is only temporary,
measured by time and space.
And so the river, from time to time,
releases its fury to remind the man
of his inevitable mortality.

I, who has been walking
on the strand for so long,
sit next to the transparent god
who has been there when we first met
long way up the stream.
I think of the time we travelled together
and how you left for the other shore
just when the river showed us its rage.
I’ve been sitting here for endless time now,
seen hundred suns go up and down,
cold rain, ferocious wind with no shelter
for weary soul.

Now it must be the time to finally move on
for you are not here,
not in any way near me,
only in my head,
only in memory,
and the love I feel is only in the past,
upstream where we’ll never walk again.
So farewell to you
and farewell to 2020.