Something about being small children
in a Himalayan light garden,
flying our kites from rooftops,
goes beyond grief.
You caught my heart because you were born there,
among the barren and brown-shouldered mountains,
a tiny baby like a star in the deep, empty sky.
Light, falling unbroken by tree or tower,
fell upon our necks in playful swipes,
its dance in the endless sky a festival in Eden
for archangels, not for missionary, Western children
rearranging our Western doll houses
on the empty plateaus below,
the playing fields of vanquished, exiled demons.
When we left Afghanistan,
our metal wings hesitantly lifting in the air—
I dreamt over and over of fire,
our cradled loves burning back into dirt,
the curling, tortured remains of houses and hills crying out:
You can never come back.
Yet, beyond all fire, like the still waters of Band-e Amir, blue light-catchers,
you look across at me in the flames,
the way Afghan eyes still stare within my burning wilderness,
a look of ancient purity, sorrow mixed with mercy. 
