he wakes up,
eyes open wide, expanding white between
skin and pupil, staring at glow stars he hasn't seen in ten years,
breathless in wonder (horror?) how
-his hands aren't shaking or covered in blood,
nails ripped and bitten, rough coleuses lining the insides
and it isn't fair,
because he had to watch his mother
become a shell of herself, scraping to
the bottom of the pit, cringing and frantic in her movements,
(before all he had was a folded old photo)
wishing for a father that he can't even remember.
(he probably died in the bombings,
and even though he hadn't been home for years
his mother still hoped)
it's the cornered animals who fight the hardest,
and he wishes he didn't understand why.
