You are bound up with that old tragedy in my heart,
the farce of sorts we all played,
rearranging our Western doll houses
on the empty plateaus, playing fields of famished demons.
But something about being small children
in the Himalayan light garden,
flying our dreams from rooftops 800 years in the past,
goes beyond grief.
You caught my heart when you were born there,
among the barren and feral mountains,
a tiny baby like a star in the deep, empty sky.
When we left Afghanistan,
and when I left you again years later,
the wings hesitantly lifting in the air—
both times I dreamt over and over of fire,
cradled love burning back into dirt,
the curling, tortured remains of houses and hills crying out:
You can never go back.
Still you are bound up with my heart,
still, you look up at me from out of the flames,
the way Afghan eyes still stare within my wilderness,
ancient sorrow mixed with mercy. 
