grrroart

(3/3) Did anyone know where it was? I’d show them the map, but they wouldn’t recognize the place.
“That’s not what it’s called,” they would say.
“Are you sure it was here?”
I wasn’t sure. How could I be? I had been a kid, but I remember the house, and the trees with the papayas. We’d have them for breakfast. I hated it. I still hate papayas. I drifted away from my house, the tape on the windows, the sirens at night, the bombs, the fire…
I drifted away and took the sea, then the ocean, and just like before, the land was swallowed until another piece of land emerged. It was different. It was older. Maybe because we didn’t have fires.
I drifted again—from person to person, from corner to corner. I’d ask again and again if they knew the land near the sea with the papaya trees.
“It’s right there,” I would say.
But no one knew. No one could ever say:
“Was it swallowed by the sea?”