Home of the Brave

  I have many hard places on my knees and elbows

  and a hat like a round ball on my head.

  This is good because I fall down every time

  I try to stand on the skateboard.

  Hannah is trying not to laugh.

  I am trying not to fall.

  Lookin’ good, buddy, Dave says,

  but he is just being kind.

  Why don’t you take a break for a minute?

  I’ve got some things to talk over with you.

  I talked to Lou yesterday.

  We sit on a bench in front of the apartment.

  Hannah comes, too.

  So you know about the farm, I say.

  I take off my round extra head

  and give it to Hannah.

  I’m sorry, Dave says. I know you

  liked working there.

  I’ll try to find you another place to help out.

  Another place won’t have Gol, I say.

  Listen, buddy, Dave says,

  I’m afraid I’ve got some more news.

  I heard from Diane.

  They tracked down the people who made it

  to the two refugee camps we told you about.

  Something grabs my throat

  and tries to steal the air away.

  None of them was your mom, Kek.

  I look away.

  Nearby a crow flaps his great, black wings

  to chase away a sparrow.

  Hannah pats my back.

  There’s still hope, though,

  right? she asks.

  Dave clears his throat.

  There’s another small refugee camp

  about eighty miles south.

  We’re checking out that one.

  I nod.

  Remember how your aunt told me

  you’re an optimist, Kek? Dave asks.

  I need you to stay strong.

  In my pocket I feel the soft blue and yellow

  fabric I have carried for so long.

  I remember something Ganwar said to me.

  Thank you for your helping, Dave, I say,

  but what I’m thinking

  is that a man knows when he’s defeated.

  SLEEP STORY

  I’m in our tent at the camp,

  and all around me children and women sleep.

  We are too crowded to lie down.

  We sleep on each other, legs and arms twined.

  There is moaning and snoring and muttering and drooling,

  but it’s a kind of uneasy peace.

  I’m not so hungry tonight.

  Grain came in bags from the helping people today.

  Mosquitoes buzz at the tent flaps,

  louder and louder still,

  and then I know it is the drone of a flying boat.

  The gunfire is almost gentle at first—pop—pop—pop,

  and then it gets closer

  and the world goes crazy with fear.

  Children scream, mothers sob, men threaten.

  A fire is burning somewhere close.

  My mother takes my hand, firm, sure.

  Come, my child, she says, as if we are

  going for a walk to look at the moon.

  We run from the tent

  pretending a safe place lies just a few steps away.

  My mother falls, her dress caught on a bush,

  and then the gunfire comes harder,

  flying toward us like hot little stars.

  Run, Kek, my mother screams, run now.

  I kneel beside her. I can’t leave you, I say,

  or I think I say, for my voice is swallowed

  by the roaring night.

  My leg’s hurt, I can’t run. You hide in the trees.

  You can get help for me when it’s safe.

  Go. Now.

  I start to run and I don’t know

  that I’m clutching her dress

  and a tiny piece rips free

  and I run

  and the trees are waiting

  and the men come

  with their knives and their guns and their mysterious hate.

  I wait with other children.

  I hold a little child and cover her mouth

  when she tries to cry.

  Dawn comes, silence comes,

  blood and death are everywhere.

  And my mother is gone.

  CONFESSION

  I awake to no blood, no bodies,

  no Mama.

  I’m on the sofa, and Ganwar sits on the floor

  next to me.

  You were moaning, he says.

  It must have been a bad one.

  I wipe my wet cheeks.

  Very bad. I was in the camp,

  and the men with guns came.

  Ganwar nods. He clicks on a light

  and the shadows take form.

  I still have that one sometimes.

  Not like this one. I shiver.

  How can you be so sure? he asks.

  You can’t visit my head.

  Because mine has truth in it, I say.

  Because in mine—

  I drop my head in my hands—

  because in mine I leave Mama

  and run.

  In mine I’m a coward.

  And it’s the truth.

  Ganwar stares past me for a long time.

  He is somewhere far away

  and I know where it is.

  We all ran, Kek.

  It’s the only reason we’re here.

  I should have stayed with her.

  Even a brave man can’t stop a bullet.

  You did what you had to do.

  Ganwar joins me on the sofa.

  He puts his arm around me.

  He doesn’t seem surprised

  when I begin to sob.

  And I’m not so surprised

  when he, too, begins to cry.

  RUNNING AWAY

  I wait till Ganwar falls asleep.

  I don’t want to be here anymore.

  I don’t want to be in a place where

  my words taste wrong in my mouth.

  I don’t want to live in a place where

  candy for a kind girl makes people angry

  and every year the trees must die.

  I want to be in a place where the things

  I love and know

  are there within my reach.

  But where is that place?

  My aunt says I can find sun

  when the sky is dark.

  But she’s wrong.

  I can’t see what isn’t there.

  I check the jar where I keep my pay from Lou.

  I have a handful of green papers

  and four silver washing machine coins.

  With such riches I can run far away

  to places I’ve seen on the TV machine,

  although it will mean a lot of walking.

  Maybe I can go to Washington

  to the President’s house,

  and ask him to help find Mama.

  I know two buses—

  the bus to the grocery store and the mall,

  and the one to Lou’s farm.

  I will take the bus that comes

  to the bus stop first,

  and then at least I will be on my way.

  I would like to leave a note

  so that my aunt and Ganwar and Hannah

  won’t worry about me.

  But I don’t know yet how to write many words.

  Ganwar snores softly.

  I leave half the green papers on the sofa.

  I write my name on a scrap of paper.

  I make a heart shape like the one I gave Hannah.

  I get my jacket.

  And I go.

  BUS

  The evening air is cool and damp.

  I take the first bus that comes—

  the route that goes past Lou’s.

  I put my coins in the hungry metal mouth

  beside the driver.

 
The bus jerks and I grab a pole.

  How far does this bus go? I ask.

  To the airport, he says.

  The airport? I repeat.

  With the flying boats?

  The driver gives me a strange look.

  Sit down, kid.

  I think about this important news

  as I take a seat.

  For the first time

  I wonder if I could go back home.

  I have my green money papers, after all.

  I could fly to my home

  and find my mother myself.

  That is what a good son would do.

  I think of the vastness

  of my country.

  I think of the camp,

  the guns, the blood.

  I wonder if flying back home

  would be like the time I tried to fly

  from the top of the acacia tree.

  The bus is nearly empty.

  We pass many buildings

  and take many turns,

  and then we are on a big street I know well.

  In the soft light I see familiar places:

  the gas stations,

  the empty lots,

  the cars for sale

  with bright lights on a string overhead

  like captured stars.

  This is an ugly land, I think.

  It needs endless horizons and

  emptiness.

  Here, too many buildings block the sky.

  You can’t even watch the sun

  put on his bright pajamas

  and sink into bed.

  We’re coming close to Lou’s.

  I feel bad not to have said

  my thank-yous and good-byes

  and to have shouted at Lou in anger.

  In my old home,

  where death sneaks into your home

  in the hush of night,

  good-byes were a precious thing.

  How can I miss a place of such pain? I wonder.

  It doesn’t make sense.

  And yet there it is.

  What I miss

  is the time before the pain.

  I miss Mama and Lual and

  listening to my father sing

  a laughing song.

  In the moonlight, I see first the old gray fence,

  with new boards on the gate

  Ganwar and I had fixed.

  I see Lou’s house,

  the tree with its great brown arms outstretched,

  the sagging barn.

  I see Gol, too.

  She is in the field alone,

  staring out at the road.

  I touch the window.

  And then,

  I don’t know why,

  I yell for the driver to stop.

  TREED

  By the time I’m over the fence,

  Gol has spotted me.

  She trudges over,

  slow but determined,

  like an old woman

  longing for her grandchild’s embrace.

  When we reach each other,

  I put my head on her neck.

  You should be in the barn, I say.

  I peer over her to see if Lou is outside.

  The sky is rich with stars,

  like fresh black dirt

  sprinkled with tiny seeds.

  The moon hangs low,

  a cupped hand of silver water.

  Gol nudges me.

  I know this means she wants an ear scratch

  so I do as I am told.

  Tears warm my cheeks.

  A door slams.

  I see Lou heading to the barn.

  I crouch low beside Gol.

  I don’t want Lou to see me crying.

  She will be coming to get Gol,

  and I must hide.

  The field is empty. There’s nowhere

  to go but the big tree.

  I dash over and clamber up easily.

  It’s a good climbing tree.

  High up in the tangle of branches,

  I watch the cars charge by

  like a herd of panicked animals.

  Gol looks up at me,

  wondering why her ear scratch is over.

  She heads slowly in the direction of the tree.

  I wipe my nose on my sleeve.

  No, I say softly. Go away, Gol.

  She settles in under the tree

  and stares up at me like a

  motherless puppy.

  I’m so high,

  I should be able to see forever.

  In the starlight I imagine that

  if I try hard enough,

  I can see my family’s thatched hut,

  my father’s sharp-horned cattle,

  the tree where I learned

  I’m not meant to be a bird.

  Go away, I whisper.

  I am going to be here for a long time.

  GANWAR

  I have been in the tree forever

  when I hear a bus screech to a stop.

  Far across the field

  I can just make out a tall figure

  climbing down the bus stairs.

  Ganwar leaps over the fence

  and strides across the field.

  He’s heading toward the barn,

  but then he stops. He looks at Gol.

  He looks up into the branches of my tree.

  And he laughs.

  Please don’t tell me

  you’re trying to fly again, he says.

  How did you find me here? I ask in a loud whisper.

  I woke up when you shut the door.

  I watched from the window when you got on the bus

  and I took the next one.

  Why? I demand.

  Ganwar shrugs. Don’t know exactly.

  But it was worth it, just to see you

  stuck up there.

  Using his good hand,

  in one graceful move

  he climbs up to join me.

  I don’t want company, I say.

  He ignores me. So you’re running away?

  I’m trying.

  Where to?

  Maybe I am going home to find Mama.

  Ganwar nods. You think that’s what she would want?

  It’s what a man would do, I say.

  Ganwar rubs his chin. Hmmm. What if she’s

  already on her way here?

  I rub my eyes. Suddenly I feel tired.

  If I lie back on this branch, I feel I could

  fall asleep for a week.

  I’m not used to making so many decisions.

  I’m not used to so many changes.

  In my old world, I was just Kek,

  the silly boy. I was Lual’s little brother,

  Ganwar’s troublesome cousin,

  my parents’ mischievous child.

  That was all,

  and that was enough.

  I sigh. There are too many hard things,

  I say softly. I can barely hear my own words.

  It isn’t fair.

  I just want … I want everything I lost.

  Ganwar rubs the place where his hand should be.

  I look away.

  I don’t want to think about what

  he has lost.

  Maybe I’ll come with you, Ganwar says.

  No, I say firmly. You stay.

  But it will never be right for me here, Kek.

  I have this—he holds up his stump of an arm—

  and I have the gaar. It’s worse for me.

  I’ll never fit in.

  If you’re giving up,

  why shouldn’t I?

  I don’t answer him.

  But when I look at Ganwar’s arm,

  I think of how he leapt into the tree

  like it was his only home.

  And how he does all the work I do

  with just one good hand to help him.

  I remember something my mama

  used to say on dark days:

  If you can talk
, you can sing.

  If you can walk, you can dance.

  Ganwar, I whisper,

  what if she never comes?

  What if it’s only … me?

  I can’t do it all by myself.

  Ganwar sends me a sad smile.

  My cousin, he says,

  you already are.

  TALK

  I hear the crunch of someone walking.

  Lou comes out of the barn.

  Gol? she calls.

  What are you up to, old girl?

  Slowly Lou makes her way over.

  She follows Gol’s gaze up into the tree.

  My, my, she says.

  This may be the first time in history

  a cow has treed two boys.

  We climb down slowly.

  When I get to the bottom,

  Gol nudges me again.

  She wants her ear scratch to continue.

  I force myself to meet Lou’s eyes.

  Moonlight glints on her silver hair

  like ice on snow.

  I’m sorry, I say.

  For being angry with you.

  It isn’t your fault

  about the farm.

  Lou smiles. Come on, you two.

  I could use a hand.

  We head toward the barn.

  Gol follows.

  Kind yellow light spills from the house.

  Lou and Ganwar and I stand there in the silent barn,

  stroking Gol

  and waiting.

  After a while, I help Lou

  toss some fresh hay into Gol’s stall.

  How’d you end up in my tree this evening?

  Lou finally asks.

  I don’t want to say the truth.

  But when Lou looks right at you, you cannot

  make up stories.

  I’m running away, I say.

  I see.

  Lou thinks about this for a moment.

  Want a cookie before you go?

  I think, too.

  A cookie would not be such a bad thing.

  Chocolate? I ask.

  Yep.

  I follow Lou and Ganwar into the house.

  It might be a long time

  before I see chocolate again.

  CHANGES

  I take a handful of cookies

  to show my gratitude.

  Lou sits across from us at the

  kitchen table.

  The light spreads gentle shadows.

  So you’re running away,

  Lou says. That’s a mighty big job.

  I watch while Lou gets us glasses of milk.

  On top of the cold box there is a picture in a frame.

  I see a pretty woman smiling.

  A man has his arm around her.

  He is tall and proud.

  Behind the woman is a small tree.

  Lou follows my gaze.

  That’s me, she says. A very long time ago.

  And my husband, Robert. And that tree

  is the one you two climbed just now.

  I stare at the picture, then back at Lou.