Day 613

Two children are buried
under the rubble of their home:
a five year old boy
and a baby.  Their mother,
too, is buried.  The five year old
cries, screams, lets anyone still alive
know he is there with his mother
and baby brother.  People
whose houses have also
just been bombed
rush to the cries, begin
digging.  (And this
is a story of community,
of sumud…) They dig,
They dig harder.  Faster.
They dig with their hands.
They dig with rocks, turn pieces
of rubble to shovels.  Dig.
At last , after hours,
they free them.  They
are all alive!  All
three.  A neighbor
who has just freed the baby
from his fallen house, his
fallen life, lays him
now in his father’s arms.
He is whole.  He will go on living.