Day 996

From a photograph

On a sunny afternoon in June,
children are sitting in rows,
waving at the camera. It’s
their graduation day. From
what the viewer can tell
of their ages, it must be
middle school. One girl
in the front row wears something
someone had made to look
like a graduation gown, a keffiya
around her neck, a rolled paper
in her lap, secured by her hands.
She will not let this
slip away: not the diploma,
not the afternoon, not
the friendships, not the memory
of everything that has happened
before this day. Who will count
how many parents, sisters, brothers
aren’t here to watch? Who will number
the missing books, houses, limbs?
The displacements, the empty chairs
in the makeshift classrooms? Who
will say, in a year, even a month, which
of these children will still
be living?