The language becomes narrower each day;

Our actions and our words decelerate.

Only in the aftermath of slaughter

Do we attempt to find the words for death:

Some words to tick the box and shrug it off,

To come to terms with our cheap cuts of guilt.

Their boy lies, unresponsive, while we live

To relish the chaos of adulthood.

Truth is complicated. Dumped in a hole,

Until just now he lived the same as us.

Rusty, we search our lexicon high and low

For his greying face, his silent pleading,

His untold tales. The fortunate will crib

From neighbours’ answers, like tablets of stone.