This is where we belong

I.

You walked for miles
distances measured not in numbers
but in strides
and falling bodies
and stumbling feet
measured in each time you heard
the wailing
of a woman, or man, or child
until
they
all began to
sound
the
same.

You are in photographs
in history books
women with scarves
wrapped
covering their hair
to keep the dust
off
but now
it’s been so long
the dust has crept underneath
cloth
underneath
skin
in between the space
that separates
your eyes
from the skin
around it
there is dust
everywhere.

You grip the box
inside
your mother’s jewelry
your father’s wedding ring
a ticket stub
reminding you of
the day you
took your family
to an open air
show
and your children sat
on the grass
even though you brought a
blanket
red and white
and cliched
and beautiful
and warm
from the sun as it set
and your youngest ran
and stumbled
and grazed her knee
and you kissed it better
because when there are no plasters
and painful, stinging dettol
to clean the wound
a
little bit of water
from a bottle
and a kiss
can make it better.

And the children played
and you lay in each other’s arms
and smiled and watched
and never would have imagined
that a year later
so many of you would be dead
and the rest would be
walking
walking
walking
away.

II.

You know that it has happened
elsewhere
in another time
but it wouldn’t
couldn’t
happen to you
and your family
and your children
and your brother
and to the nice lady who lives down the street
and insists
each time you see her
that she give you a loaf
of fresh baked bread
and you breathe it in
and it reminds you of your mother

and you don’t think
of massacres
and genocide
and broken bones
and bleeding mouths
and teeth
and women’s legs forced open
to guns
and brutality
men beaten
to a pulp
hit over and over
so the women who slept next to them
each night
for years
would not recognize their faces.

No.

These things don’t happen to you.

You pay your bills
and taxes
and punch in at 9am
on. the. dot.
You spend one day
of the week
in the house of God
and you sing
and pray
and praise His name
and bow before Him
and you know
that He forgives
your little sins
the night you drank too much wine
and flirted a bit more
than you know is
right
or the time you were given
more change
than you should have
and you took it anyway

and these are little
transgressions
nothing
that should bring down the wrath
of an angry God on you
and your people.
But something did.

III.

Something, somewhere
snapped
and the earth split
and bones cracked

and that fight
that you were having
the night before
and went to bed angry
your backs to each other
didn’t matter anymore
and suddenly
your story was filled
with bombs and guns
and war
and famine
and poverty
and split tribes
and invading tribes
and mortar shells in your backyard
and the neighbour’s dog
laying in a pool
of something darker
than blood
until you realise
it is everything
that should be inside
not outside
not in plain sight

and you grab your children
and run in doors
and scurry under
beds
and pray
that the sounds
of guns
and boots
and shouting men
don’t
come
any
closer.

And you cry
and your breath is shallow and heavy and slow
because suddenly you are aware
of each
in
take
each
breath let out
because it is a moment longer
that you have lived
in the middle of fear
and loss
and heartache

but life is better
than any of this
and you swear to yourself
and your children
and your love
that you, each and everyone of you,
will live
and you want to believe it
but
the day comes
when you realize
the promise was a lie
and you hold a lifeless body in your arms
and try so hard
to breathe life back into it
each in take
each out
in
out
and nothing
changes
because your hand is holding the back of a head
that is broken
and crushed
and your fingers are wet
with blood
but you tell yourself
it’s water
from when you were washing the dishes
and the blast
it hit
and no
this doesn’t
happen
to
you.

Until it does.