on arrival,
you saw the sky open,
like a vast and mirthless laugh;
and panicked / were suffocated by the spaces.

the vacant silences
drank your purpose,
opened the mind so far,
but not near.

you knew, from the desert
the flies would come,
eating the flesh’s rich
and delicate prize,

in this country like death:
as near as the wrist,
but far as fear.

(published in Westerly; Indian Ocean Issue.. Vol. 24, No 3)