Day 985

A child of seven is killed
holding her father’s hand.
Her father is also killed.
Where were they walking?
Where had they been?
What were the last words
they said to each other?
What was the last meal
they ate? Who
was the last child
the girl played with,
outside her tent
on a summer morning
that day or the day before?
A child of seven. Everything
she had learned — reading,
a little arithmetic, the names
of rivers and continents
and birds — everything
she’d worked to memorize
lost now. Useless. Gone.
She died holding
her father’s hand: some
slight comfort? Their blood
flowing together
in the dusty street.