Day 550

In a fraction of a second
half your family is gone.
Your wife.  One
of two sons.  One
of two daughters.  As though
you’d all been looking
in a mirror, seen yourselves
reflected; and the mirror
suddenly shatters.  The children
still in their holiday clothes, the girls
with painted nails.  You open 
your eyes, look around, after someone —
a neighbor? — helps you out
from under the crushed wall
of your house.  Your living children
are walking through smoke and dust
half-blinded, dazed.  The two children
who have been killed
seem to be sleeping
under the rubble:  they don’t
make a sound; while the two
who are living have started
to whimper, to call out the names
of their sister, their brother.
To call for their mother.  You think
for a moment they’ll wake, stand.
Answer.