in the backstreets of Mosul
(or maybe Falluja)
it happens like a
meteor streaking across the
pre-dawn horizon
An Iraqi girl or (as she'd rather be called) teen"
standing before a window
conjures
a new thought
Something never before conceptualized
The sort of notion that, if nurtured and respected,
might alter the course of human history
Before she can savor more than three
seconds of epiphany...before her eyes can even display
the joy of revelation,
she is mistaken for an "insurgent"
(or was it "terrorist"?)
Sun begins to rise
Rays of light shoot through
bullet holes in her tattered window shade
The girl takes her last breath
as yet another day begins