Hungarian Lyrics

CENTURY'S END

I may be the last one who can say that I rode the trains
or marched with my congregation through a Black Forest rain
Past gypsy camps and the open pit shame
I was 21 and shackled and now I remain
as the last one who can say that I rode the trains

I may be the last one who can say that I saw the ash
or felt the fresh cut of barbed wire in no-man's land
Between all the farms gone blind and afraid
to see the trains come full and leave with no blame
I may be the last one who can say that I saw the ash

At century's end though our births were not noted
our deaths as survivors must not be forgotten
Blood in mass graves will soak past the bottom
by the time all the names of our towns are forgotten
I'm the last one who can say that I saw

In textbooks our pictures are anonymous quiet and flat
In black and white grains remain families splintered and shot
but the look in the eye of it that's past and done
It's second hand memory for those who are too young
to have stood in the gas wearing the star
or heard our names called from the cattle cars
to be left for fillings and piles of shoes
or feel our memories dying at century's end

Translation