Not the smartest perhaps, not the strongest nor the most resourceful
and in the end,
all his efforts to sustain and protect us and to protect himself failed.
But he had stayed with me to the end,
stayed with my children.
Even the one who was not his.
Sometimes I would think of my other men,
especially when he grasped and groped me in his clumsy way,
and I would think of how it had been,
how it could be.
But the smooth and the experienced had not stayed with me,
did not find food for us,
did not stand and fight when all escape was impossible.
Because by that time they themselves had already escaped,
traveling light
and unburdened by ties.