8
0音乐剧《河口之处》第四部
第八曲
全剧终
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《Grandmother's River（外祖母的河）》
时间：2003年，第二次刚果战争结束后，和平协议签署之际。
恩萨拉已经离世两年。她的外孙女正值青春年华，即将步入婚姻。在村庄重新恢复平静的日子里，她一边编织嫁衣，一边唱起外祖母童年时教给她的歌。歌中没有战争，没有仇恨，只有河流、树木、飞鸟、雨季，以及一个普通女人对家庭、土地和未来最朴素的期盼。
然而，观众知道，这份来之不易的宁静只是短暂的停歇。远方再次传来的枪声预示着新的冲突即将降临。年轻的歌者仍沉浸在对婚姻和未来的憧憬中，正如半个世纪前的恩萨拉一样，相信生活终将胜过苦难。
《外祖母的河》既是一首献给恩萨拉的追忆之歌，也是一首献给刚果无数普通女性的歌。她们在时代的洪流中养育生命、守护家庭，把希望一代又一代地传递下去，如同奔流不息的刚果河。
Grandmother's River
Set in 2003, shortly after the signing of the peace agreement that formally ended the Second Congo War.
Nsala has been gone for two years. Her granddaughter, now a young woman preparing for marriage, sits weaving her wedding cloth and softly sings the simple song her grandmother taught her as a child. It is a song of rivers, birds, mango trees, rain, and home—a song untouched by politics, spoken in the language of ordinary life.
Yet the audience knows what she does not: the peace is fragile. Beyond the village, the echoes of violence have not disappeared. As the melody unfolds, memories of Nsala's youth merge with the granddaughter's dreams, revealing how hope survives from one generation to the next, even as history threatens to repeat itself.
Grandmother's River is both a remembrance of Nsala and a tribute to countless Congolese women whose quiet resilience has carried families, communities, and memories through decades of conflict. Like the Congo River itself, their stories continue to flow long after they are gone.
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Grandmother's River
Grandma said,
wash with the river.Grandma said,
sing with the birds.Grandma said,
never count sorrow.Count the children.
Count the stars.
Chorus
River, carry me home.
River, carry my name.
If I forget,
you remember.
River,
remember me.
Grandma laughed
under the mango tree.
Grandma danced
before the rains.
Grandma loved
one quiet man.
She made a home
with empty hands.
(Chorus)
Now I weave
my wedding cloth.
Now I dream
my wedding song.
I wear her beads.
I wear her smile.
I think the road
is kind.
(Chorus)
But the birds
fly all at once.
Mothers listen.
Dogs grow still.
Somewhere far,
the earth remembers
another gun.
(The chorus returns very softly.)
River,
carry me home.
River,
carry my name.
If I forget,
you remember.
River...
remember me.
