Past the checkpoint,
you spot a man
with a backpack, waving
a rag above his head.
And when your father
spots him too, takes
his eyes off the road
to take in this figure
emerging from the bush,
you wonder what he thinks,
if he sees himself in this man,
if he remembers, as you
believe the blank stare
in his face says he does,
his own crossing, how it
wasn’t until the third, fourth,
maybe even fifth attempt
that he made it to the river,
and how at the river—
moonlight scarred on
its murky surface—
he didn’t think twice before
jumping in, knowing
that he if didn’t emerge
a new man, then at least he’d
come out breathing new air,
and that when he walked
farther into this new land,
someone who had made it
was bound to pick him up,
to see him waving by the side
of some road, ready to lend
more than just a hand.