Poem ‘Dear Homeland Village!’ by Hans Scheib, no year
Hans Scheib was born in 1941 in Winterbach near St. Wendel in Saarland. After his military draft in 1960, he was supposed to serve in the army. Instead, he decides to leave his homeland for Canada. He is lured by the sense of adventure and the stories about the endless expanses of the country. With the former troop ship ‘Arkadia’, he first travels to Quebec and then continues towards London/Ontario. With little money in his pocket, Hans Scheib manages to become self-employed through a lot of hard work. He lives the upward mobility dream of many emigrants. Together with his wife Heidi Mergenthaler, a Palatine woman whom he meets in English class and marries in 1963, Hans Scheib has lived in Canada with two sons and four grandchildren to this day. In the poem ‘Dear Homeland Village!’, Hans Scheib reflects on his place of origin. Nostalgically, he realizes that he is left with only memories of this place. Many emigrants turn to lyrical forms to process experiences of farewell, separation, and loneliness, or to convey their own feelings to the family members who remained behind in their homeland.
