The Poet’s Voice
I don’t want freedom gram by gram, grain by grain.
I have to break this steel chain with my teeth!
I don’t want freedom as a drug, as a medicine,
I want it as the sun, as the earth, as the heavens!
Step, step aside, you invader!
I am the loud voice of this land!
I don’t need a puny spring,
I am thirsting for oceans!
About this poem
This poem, representing Azerbaijan, is part of The Written World – our collaboration with BBC radio to broadcast a poem from every single nation competing in London 2012.