Poetry Report: Bangladesh Factory Fire
“how buying one
last orange,
to hold its fire”
This picture touched me deeply. Humanity hardly deserves the dignity this couple gives it.
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Embrace
They say our lives
are worth nothing.
They say we are less
than pennies.
When we walk home
hands clasped
in the market,
just tired meat on
tottering frames
of bone,
I can still hear
these valuations,
but it's astonishing
how buying one
last orange,
to hold its fire
up to your smile
can silence all thought.
Nothing can be said
when your embrace
is worth a million years.
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Photo by Taslima Akhter.