To A World Of Adversity

I am not a foreigner to a world of adversity.

I was a child when we entered Desert Storm. The shapes of my letters and numbers were learned by day and, by night, I traced the battle lines on the news live from Kuwait. I fluttered my arms like a butterfly and twirled across the stage in the school play, and laid in my bed at night, my mind a flutter with images of Saddam Insane. I played hand tag at lunch recess and, later, raised a salute at Fort Sill to envoys of fathers, sons, mothers, and...