For Rayan Abdullah Zakaria Al-Astal, Age 0

 

Rayan, dear boy, aged the absence of integer

Aged the yawning mouth of infant hoisted 

Upon mother’s shoulder, maw of wolves 

Shadowing the clouds. Aged the circumference 

Of bullet & bomb. Aged the repetend currencies

Knelling each small death. Aged the wide eye

Of a world seeing & sitting still. Rayan. Zero

Steps taken, tenuous on toddling legs, zero words

Warping themselves like wet wood

Around syllabaries, zero arresting

Tableaus, zero sudden declarations

Of love, zero featherlight touches of skin, zero

Shocks of plunging into cold water, teeth white

& glimmering against the slate blue, ballast of cresting wave, 

Zero refuges in pine-dappled shade. Zero songs tinseled

Over boughs of trees in the effulgence of lilacs

Or saltlines of tears latticing your cheek, naps

Beside a dog. Rayan, I sing your one name this morning 

& the notes marinate in bitterness

For all the wide world taken from you before

we pushed you headlong & wordless past this

Adumbrated threshold. You deserved

Better.

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