You brought forward
all of your gold
all of your jewels
all of your shoes
all of your hope
and you received
a stone. Years later
I stand, free, looking
at a piece of nothing
you received in return
for everything.

A mountain
of dead, and I
am not crying, it’s just
a bit of ash that flew
and found its way into
my eye.

“And they all
slept huddled together, and
when one turned over, all
had to shift.” What a gift
that my lying this close
to you is only
my choice.

How have you managed to condense
a whole person to one pair
of shoes, and over 430,
000 pairs of shoes in one
tiny cell block.

A model
of the whole camp, miniature buildings
standing in silence, in unison
with us. I turn to you, knowing
we are both thinking
the same thing- how huge
even a miniature
is.  “A person could get lost
in this place,” I whisper wryly, and you
nod. Could
does not exist solely
in the realm of possibility
anymore.