Ode to the Udi
North of the Zagros, where the Caucasus lifts,
your villages—Nij, Oghuz—hold a quiet flame.
Udi tongue, Lezgic lilt, older than borders,
kept like bread still warm under cloth.
Church stones remember Alban—
Caucasian Albanian hands, script once lost,
faith patched and carried through winters,
names whispered back into daylight.
We meet as neighbors of the same sky,
you by the Kura and vine, we by the Zagros and dust.
On the map of blood we stand a little farther—
not strangers, only hills between.
Keep your language ringing like a small bell,
your hearths steady, your children unafraid.
May every road that leaves your valley
return carrying your name: Udi.