Day 481/Ceasefire Day 11

(for A.)

It was a dream, a wish to get back
to the north
But finally after 15 months, we are
back the young man
writes to me, and All my family
members are ok
I moved from sleeping in streets
to be under a roof
It’s like moving from hell to heaven
We must remember
there are stories like this one.
The young man buried
for three days under the rubble
with his wife, their unborn baby
dead, goes back to his family home
(his own place destroyed)
after fifteen months
and finds everyone there, waiting.
The bed of his childhood waiting.
Food waiting, warmth. We must remember
that in the midst of loss (his friend
martyred days before
the cease fire, the child
in the womb for eight months — who
would he have been?) there is also joy.
Welcoming.  Celebration.
That sadism, brutality, destruction
cannot claim their victory.
That among the crushed streets
the spirit survives, not crushed.