𝗙𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗦𝗺𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗩𝗲𝗿𝗯𝘀

I was in Africa and there was war in Europe.

A riad courtyard in Marrakech, beneath an orange tree and the first light of spring.

I am showing my 18-month-old son how to stroke the tortoise that lives in the garden.

Gently I say, like this. With the tips of your fingers. Like you're hardly there. Remember all animals are wild of heart. However soft or smooth, small or slow.

And people are animals too, little one. So quit poking me in the eye, or else I'll come and eat you up.

In his eyes, I see another kind of wildness and mirrors, glossy and new. A heart wide-open.

The last time tanks entered a European city, I was a child.

I remember the maps in the weekend papers. Far away places called Sarajevo and Mostar. Sebrenica and Pristina. And my parents saying these places are not so far away.

That somewhere there too a parent crouches over a child, showing them that the world is fabulous if you know how to be gentle.

With the cold chill of deep shame, I recall now the frisson of excitement as I studied the news from my kitchen table. Under a roof that would not collapse, safe in a house without fear.

I was living in interesting times. History was busy being done. And oh, how I loved history.

Years later, a Bosnian guide shows me the sniper fire in the walls of his city. The alley where ordinary people walked out to die.

In Kosovo, we stumble into a burnt-out Serb neighbourhood. Amongst the ruins, there are charred toys. We intrude on recent ghosts & retreat in silence to the living in the main square.

My son points out the birds wheeling above. And the oranges in the tree. Saying their names like spells, to bring them into being.

I am trying not to look at my phone. I'm frightened of what I might read there. I must stay with my son in the world of nouns. Tortoise. Orange. Bird. 

I'm fearful of verbs. Already, his cousin asks my sister: why is Russia fighting Ukraine? 

Verbs are gathering in the corners & in the sky. Fight. Flee. Kill. Die.

I take my son's small hand in mine, put his finger to the hard edge of the animal's shell.

Gently, I say. Like this.