Day 495/Ceasefire Day 25

A year ago, when the shelter was bombed,
the baby’s mother was killed.  His father,
his older siblings, escaped; but the father
could not go back to save the smallest one,
could not get back inside.  For a year, he
has grieved, has felt a part of himself
died, got left behind with the baby.
He did not know that another father,
escaping, heard the baby’s cries,
was near enough to take him
in his arms, bring him
to his wife, his children.  For all this year
they’ve raised him as their own.
Shared the little food they’ve had
with him, helped him walk, 
talk. And now they have found
each other, the two fathers.  Now
they have stood together, facing
each other, the one who couldn’t
save his son and the one
who saved him.  Now the baby’s
first father is watching, awed, as his child
walks toward him:  confused, not
knowing him at first, turning
toward the family he’s known
all these months.  Now the father
who saved this child looks
into the eyes of the first father,
tells him, he has always been yours,
he belongs to you. And the first father
takes the boy in his arms, kisses 
his head, tears streaming down
his face.  And this is a story
of a family who had nothing,
who shared the nothing they had
with a child they picked up
by chance, because there was no one else
to claim him;  and this is a story
of a man who grieved his own inability
to save his child, whose child
is restored to him by the goodness
of people he didn’t know, whom now
he will count as family, the child
uniting them, their bond
not severable.