Prologue: I am thinking of a shoe

I am thinking of a shoe.
I am thinking of a shoe
washed up on the seashore.
Whose was it?
How come it’s here?

I am thinking of a child.
I am thinking of every child.
I am thinking of the drowned child,
very small,
the drowned child…
Washed up on the shore like
a bottle
Or a plastic bag
Or a shell,
(Better a shell
once a home for a creature)
a single flipflop.

Limp,
in his dark blue shorts and red top
Face downwards in the shallow waves
Lapping
His eyes shut,
Head turned slightly to the left side
His lucky shoes still on his little feet
Face downwards
His arms by his sides,
palms upwards
As he would sleep in his cot.
Yielding
Trusting
Dreaming dreams no one will ever know
and that he’ll never tell
(Perhaps he didn’t have the words yet)
Face downwards as
how his mother would wake him
hold him
feed him warm milk
kiss his face
tell him she loved him.

The child’s name is Alan Kurdi
He was Syrian.
Alan Kurdi,
just for a moment
stopped the world in its tracks.
How can this be we cried out?
How can we let this happen?
And we looked at the solemn face of the soldier
carrying Alun in his arms from the shoreline.
He looked like he was quietly crying,
but not letting this deter his grim task.

Alan,
His child’s body washed up
near Bodrum.
A tourist resort.
A beauty spot.

Because Alan’s dinghy never made it to Greece
Where he was supposed to land with his family.
And join their family in Canada.
To freedom from war.

Alan Kurdi, just for a moment
stopped the world in its tracks.
How can this be we cried out?’