Day 1,129

In the pit of night
a rat bit your child’s toe.
He woke, screamed. You
opened your eyes
to see the rat hurry
across the floor of the tent,
already starting to flood with rain.
Your little boy’s blood
staining the rainwater.
You take an edge of the blanket
and wipe your son’s toe. Little toe,
perfect toe: what
will you put on it
to keep it from getting infected?
You have no ointments, no medicines.
Not even a strip of gauze
to wrap it in. Rain
is beating against the flimsy walls
of the tent. Your child still crying.
His face contorted
in pain. In fear. Will
more rats come? he’s asking you.
If I sleep, will they come
and bite me again?
You would lie in order
simply to comfort him,
to let him fall asleep peacefully again,
but you can’t do it. All
you can do is hold him
and rock him, there
on the watery tent floor;
there in that place, targeted
by more instruments of torment
than you could name.