After The Old Masters

The father looks up to the sky or ceiling (beyond the grey scale of the photograph) with his son wrapped inside his cradling arms. An orderly obscures the boy’s midsection, with silence says he is beyond all healing. Outside the frame in colour copter strafe restokes the ire of Taliban gendarmes who soothe the mother twisted in dejection. We do not catch a whiff of her pained retching, catch sight of their clenched fists or hear their words. We see the father’s sorrow-stricken eyes in what could almost be a Rembrandt etching, his pitch black pupils focused heavenwards to where God’s justice or His mercy lies.