when i grow up i want to be a forester
like my grandfather
i never met him but i often imagine him
wearing that jacket he's wearing in all the old photos
stepping through the woods
holding a gun in his rough hands
they say his eyes were blue like the sky
i wouldn't know
for me he's always been just black and white
i don't have his blue eyes
maybe that's why i'm forever fascinated by blue-eyed people

they say i got the temper of my father's mother
she chased her husband with a shovel through the town
i bet he had it coming, the bastard

when i grow old
i want to live at the border between the sky and the barley
i want to die alone in a september night
somewhere very far from home
i remember my mother explaining me the meaning of the ukrainian flag when i was very little
i'm forever fascinated by that image
i don't have my father's green eyes either
but i have his hair and his predisposition to alcoholism

when i grow younger i want to be an astronaut
i'm never going to grow old
i want to have gray hair and wrinkles
but i know i will die young
and i don't want people to keep photos of me
but i will love it if they make flutes out of my bones
and play me
i don't need to be remembered
i just need to be

when i grow up i want to be
music
barley
everybody
everything
nothing