**so many people love this poem and honest to god I don't know why.
~~~~
In the shelter, dust leaking from the ceiling,
we sit. My hands over your ears
muffle the sobs,
the rockets,
the wailing sirens.
I fail to calm even my own nerves or
halt the ragged, shaking man’s prayers.
In small brown hands you cradle
a bus token.
Old and rusted, the date rubbed right off
like the hair on the back of a baby’s head.
The texture of bullets before they burst,
blooming then
into someone’s chest,
or head,
or back,
no matter the nation we’ll bleed red.
Your fingers tremble against the rough, worn metal.
Both of us vibrate with the same impatient energy.
Each thinking
‘Just hurry up and kill me!’
The final explosion sends dust clouds
spiraling to the floor.
Silence fills the room.
Then guards by the stairs start shouting.
There’s an old woman,
with fingers, curved and cut,
desperately clutching bread to her chest.
It’s brown. Crusted in flour. An entire loaf.
Across the room
our eyes meet, and I think:
‘We could eat for a week.’ And
ants could eat for a lifetime.
A short
and sweet,
well-fed life.
Not like ours. Not this time.
