SHARBAT GULA

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  • Seaglass eyes in the desert
  • green fear glaring forth
  • above a defiant mouth.
  • Russian bombs have fallen
  • in range of those young eyes,
  • have orphaned her, sent her
  • to walk through snow to the
  • camp where the foreign man
  • asked, “May I take your picture?”
  • Take your picture.
  • Take it to windows, kiosks,
  • mail boxes, fridge doors,
  • to Brooklyn Kobe Lagos London,
  • a fierce and nameless girl,
  • infinitely multiplied on paper,
  • locking eyes with the world.
  • Your concern cannot erase
  • what she has seen, restore
  • what she has lost, but it’s
  • kind of you to care, to
  • wonder if she lived.
  • Her daughters clasped close
  • to her purple burka, she looks
  • out from a page again. The soft
  • skin is lined now around those
  • eyes you know. They ward
  • your bombs away from her
  • children. Those eyes accost you,
  • from her world of sand.