Poem for Wednesday, January 2, 2013

My Initial Indifference Regarding the Death of a Terrorist

While power walking out of a guanz in my Mongolian
countryside village, my phone rang out its contrived
Franz Liszt composition tone. Moments before, I had just
devoured a bowl of homemade noodles and mutton, and
my bowels began churning after three days of dormancy,
grumbling a dirge of discontent.


I fumbled through my right pocket. A friend with whom
I had not spoken in months was calling--a pleasant
yet untimely surprise. Walking past the breastfeeding
mother statue in front of the school, I answered. So began
the multitasking challenge from hell: exchanging pleasantries
while contracting my rectal muscles and scurrying through
the springtime desert wind.


He called me to share what was perhaps the most significant
international news of the year: Osama bin Laden had been
gunned down by US forces in a compound in northern
Pakistan. He wanted to make sure I was prepared in case
the locals sought me out to congratulate me, to ask me
questions or to express any opinions.


I cannot remember how I adverted then. I cannot
remember what color the sky was, how many children
waved at me and snickered as they disappeared behind
dilapidated fences of sod and stone. I lost mental count of the
six hundred and something steps it was to my khashaa. God,
I had counted that trek dozens of times before.


I thanked him for informing me and continued my pressured
stride, having been reminded for the first time in awhile that I
was American. I passed the five-room hospital without the
slightest tinge of vindication. I turned across from the dead tree
usurped by vultures perching with scrutiny. Instead of savoring
revenge or ruing the malicious murders that occurred that one
morning, I was simply hoping my body would not explode.


When I finally stepped through the rusty makeshift gate, I was
sweating. I laid--no, dropped--my bag against the side of the
outhouse, scrambled to untuck, unbutton and unload. Afterwards,
in a word, sublime. I regained my breath, removed some toilet
paper from my pocket and wiped while the sweat evaporated
from my brow. I squatted a bit longer then left to enter my ger.


My routine continued with washing my hands, tossing my bag
on my bed, contemplating dinner and dung for the fire. But
before the fire, I stepped outside to smoke a cigarette and to gaze
from afar at any nomads that might be passing by, leading strings
of their burdened Bactrian camels along an endless line of
mountains.