A nine-year-old skips along the centre line of an abandoned street imagination empowered by sunshine blue skies
Till the low rumble of aircraft startles her and she runs for cover praying to an absent God to take her now, young heart too bruised to carry on.
A fifteen-year-old huddles in a dank underground corner already violated by a war she did not ask for, shamed by her body’s betrayal praying for a death more forgiving
A mother holds her baby close tremors such an indelible part of life now grasps for a God she once believed in sees the vacancy in adolescent eyes the joylessness of her weeping child prays for a way out of this hell.