Imagining Dr. Abu Safiya
Kind pediatrician, are you
still alive? In the bleak cell
where they’re keeping you,
do you think of the children
you cared for, all those years?
The one who was brought to you
with a bullet in his neck. The one
whose right leg was half-severed
from his body. The girl whose hand
was shattered, who loved
to draw. Before the guards
break into your thoughts
to beat you again and again,
do you remember the ones
you saved, the boy
who sat up after the surgery
and looked at the bullet
you held in your hand?
The boy who slowly
relearned to walk
on both his legs? The girl
whose mother brought you
the drawing she made of you,
months after she lay
in her hospital bed, you
tenderly holding both
her small hands in yours?
Day 1,130
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