The Strangers 

Patrick Hicks 

After we picked you up at the Omaha airport,

we clamped you into a new car seat

and listened to you yowl

beneath the streetlights of Nebraska.

Our hotel suite was plump with toys,

ready, we hoped, to soothe you into America.

But for a solid hour you watched the door,

shrieking, Umma, the Korean word for mother.

Once or twice you glanced back at us

and, in this netherworld where a door home

had slammed shut forever, your terrified eyes

paced between the past and the future.

Umma, you screamed, Umma!

But your foster mother back in Seoul never appeared.

Your new mother and I lay on the bed,

cooing your birth name,

until, at last, you collapsed into our arms.

In time, even terror must yield to sleep.