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We roamed our city streets like desert dwellers seeking the next source of food. An open store after the first air strike forced a lockdown of fear. Maybe a grocery with a smashed window so we could accidentally stumble upon a Kit Kat for the kids, maybe beans, maybe some sugar to sweeten the tea and distracts us from the taste of sand in the water. Then we'd hope our sincere weakness and willingness to live on and look at the past in sadness would be enough of an apology to the store owner. 

How does a man break? I asked myself years ago as I watched my dad dragged away into the shadow bit of Abu Ghraib. How come he is standing so strong? How can I do that? How can I stand tall as my twin daughters fight each other to get the last piece of yesterday's leftovers I stole from the neighbor's garbage can? How can I stand tall as this humiliation and desperation bacteria eats me piece by piece? How did dad used to do it? 

We walked and we walked, we stayed together because we knew a terrorist of sort would come to get one of us. Maybe we wanted to be together, or maybe we just were too envious to let another one die before us. We all carried all the paper money with a picture of a president in a lost war. If we're lucky, we could put all of it together and buy pieces of shattered glass from the furniture store window, or maybe a brick that fell of a truck. 

As I walk, I can feel those bacteria eating more and more of me. The smile I had as I kissed my wife for the first time on our wedding night, the memory of my twin princesses sleepy heads as they wake up to go to school. Slowly I can feel the parasites crawling through my body. I could feel them at my neck, I tried to scratch them out until my neck bled but they just wouldn't leave. 

Up in a distance we spotted the other desert dwellers standing in line. They have spotted an oasis in the form of a baker, sponsored by the United Institution for Foreign Aids, the fanciest wording for begging. Guarded by our enemy soldiers, keeping us in line, we stood by in a long line awaiting the mercy of some bread. 

"Can't you give me more?" An old woman at the front line cried.

"Five is the limit" A man shouted in return "I think they're more than enough for you and your daughter" 

"I still have 4 at home, please" The woman pleaded. 

"Sorry" Said the man as the soldiers started to push the woman and her daughter away "I can't help you". 

The man in front of me turned to his two sons and said "Go to the back of the line and keep a distance of couple of people between each other so they wouldn't know we're together", his sons then went to the back. 

We stood in that line, families separated, and neighbors not talking to each other so no one would think they came together. I could almost feel the parasites crawling out of my throat, I could feel myself able to take them out if I just puke. They're eating at my heart, the tip of toes, father, how did you stand tall? They took you before you could teach me that. 

The woman passed us as she was walking with her limited five pieces of bread, probably contemplating how she would distribute them. It's amazing to see that these are circumstances where the math example of distributing a specific amount of oranges among a specific amount people applies. You learn something new everyday. We were all thinking the same thing, but we also new those five pieces of bread were too precious for us. 

I could feel myself starting to fade away, the parasites and bacteria are eating the last of me. There isn't much of me left, dwelling the desert has taken its toll on me. I fell to the ground and people just kept walking over me, no one could afford losing their turn to take me to a hospital, that even if they could find one that is open. 

It's okay that they kept walking, it honestly is. Besides, there isn't much left me of me to take to a hospital anyway. Not much left to leave behind for my family. There isn't much left of me but some light in my eyes, I will leave them to the twins, maybe the next time they fight the hands over a spoon of dried rice picked up from the garbage, they'd actually spot each other. Maybe my wife could use it to spot a step, that makes all the difference between life and death. 

There isn't much left of me but some power in my will, I hope my wife would come and pick them up once the people go home. Not much left but some light in my eyes, I honestly don't even want them if it means seeing my daughters pretend to not know me for a second. I wouldn't want them if it means seeing my wife beg for more bread either. Not much left but a gasp in a suffocated, unheard voice, not allowed to speak or walk, unless foreign aids allows it. 

Not much left of me but some disbelief in sunrises, on top of it is the mercy of your hug, held together by the faith in your God. Not much left of me but some meat on my bones. Don't leave them stranded by the sea, don't leave them buried in another mass grave. And don't give them to the haunting dogs. Take whatever hope left within them, and put together the bone to form a skeleton then put it in a shrine. Hopefully when the twins come by thirty years later, they'd see their father standing tall.