“ I can’t forget, forgetting doesn’t exist.”
– Evariste Twahirwa, Rwandan refugee

We breathe molecules
that lived in space
for billions of years
and radio-waves
from galaxies we can’t see.

We breathe carbon dioxide
trapped for eons under the ocean,
charcoal from the burning rainforest,
methane from cow dung in Africa.

We breathe the exhale of volcanoes,
salamanders and lions.
Bits of skin and hair,
saliva and sweat
arrive with salt from the wave tops
of every sea. A vast pollination
this exchange with the poor
and homeless of every country.

There is such intimacy in this sharing.
What turns families, villages,
a whole people
against each other,
like lovers
becoming more cruel
than enemies
slicing out hunks
of their own hearts?