after W. H. Auden

Staring up from a field in Pakistan, your eyes
like the eyes of any child. Your face enlarged
on a poster, made so big it might be seen from the edges
of the human inhabitable zone on this lucky earth;
and viewed again on our screens, while eating
or bored in the common way, or just walking dully along.
The drones that hover their targets don’t see.

I sit outside a café at an unsteady table
on an uneven path, where another child, lifted high
on shoulders, waves her tiny hand. There’s a seamless sky
behind the weight of cherry blossom; and I’m unsure
whether to share with friends the image of you
—as pixels to the wind—or to simply forget
and build my delicate home the way I’d like it to be.