The East Timorese

His accent not local it is from far away
Where the bones of his dead wife and their four children lay
In a mass grave with hundreds of other East Timorese
In that beautiful Land by the Southern Seas.

Short and slightly built in his early fifties his hair silver gray
He said I would feel a stranger in East Timor today
My family dead and most of my friends as well
Mine is not a very nice story to tell.

Yet he does not feel bitter about his tragic loss
And with graceful acceptance he shoulders his cross
The cross that has been given to him for to bear
Yet you will not hear him say that life is unfair.

He always has a happy smile on his face
A credit to his Country his Clan and his Race
With his tragic past he has learned how to live
Those who have sinned against him in his mind he forgive.

One I do see often though not every day
About him he does have a beautiful way
He knows he cannot change the past the past forever gone
He's a man who loves life and life must go on.