What If

What if you don't know?

What if it's sunny outside,

or you are forced to make small talk 

about the weather - mild, grey,

cold, warm? Whatever!

What if you can't check your tears

as you keep your downcast gaze

upon the goods you scan

until it's time to take a payment 

and you raise your doll-glass eyes -

apologize as he asks you -

'Why so glum?' It's nothing.

But it's something.

It's everything and all of them back home.

Communications cut, the power lines 

knitted spaghetti nets of cables 

tangled amongst the rubble, the roofs of houses,

sticks and stones, the broken bones of ghosted homes.

In your mind, you're watching people 

stepping barefoot through the shrapnel of their lives.

Your mind is wandering through a junkyard city,

past the bloated corpses - unidentified, 

just numbers cranking up the death toll 

as it rises.

You scan the streets for their dear faces,

praying they were evacuated

to higher ground in time. Praying

they're alive.

But what if last week, you were laughing,

complaining about the weather,

and what if they've been counted?

The  customer, impatient -  asks you,

'What's the damage?'

You answer without thinking -

'Ten thousand, maybe more...'