you send a picture with a last plea; before the monsoons stop the mail and boats take to the streets. shrouded in khimar a gaunt face i barely remember, but a smile to make all men stare in secret. in the last nights of america we drank until sloppy drunk, until leaving normal seemed the thing to do on a saturday night. you were brave and i loved you for it, but i had a job at the mill, and a dog to take care of, and a girl waiting at home that wouldn't understand how bad i needed you to stay. you have become used to the tropical heat, the blur of languages stuck in constant prayer, the poverty of children - the difference between comfort and fear; the swell of the Meghna, men with guns. tides of uncharted seas will not move me to breathe this foreign air, taste the delta against your lips, live my life over again only to drown.