A photograph surfaced

As I landed

Black and white

Us: side by side

Early nineteen sixty one



Must’ve been spring

Roses weren't on the bushes

Though the leaves were

Your chest was bare

I was a girl

We played together

House, school, jump rope, football,

Hide and seek

You always chased me; you were one of the boys

I used to run inside the house

You

Read me poems until dawn

And when your father was at home

Your mother sang her ballads



We moved away,

The city behind forts

Was far away

My white skin twitches

And I never take my sun glasses off

It’s been so long since I’ve seen a freight plain.



Günsel Djemal 9.6.2011 London R.Gardens