© Maria Dunn, 2010

In September 2008, I took a tour of a simulated Medicins Sans Frontieres refugee camp in Edmonton. The tour guide, an MSF worker named Kevin, told a story about a former child soldier living in a refugee camp in Africa who was helping to bring the malnourished children back to health.

***

His village burned in the night
They forced him to join the fight
That soldier boy is no more
Weary of the killing war

Now refugee in a camp
Where idleness breaks a man
One day he found the feeding tent
Innocence, starved and spent

See these children
Solemn, so thin
Who could turn away?
Such a small thing to stay

With some it takes a while
Until they have strength to smile
But oh how his spirit lifts
At each of these tiny gifts

What can one man do?
What can one man bring?
So simple, so rich
The precious within

Brothers they reprimand
They tease him “Milkman”
He shouldn’t do the women’s part
But he knows a stubborn heart

Hope in his baby son
These tenacious ones
Sorry for the lives he took
Grateful now to offer good

What can one man do?
What can one man bring?
So simple, so rich
The precious within

***

Maria Dunn vocal, guitar
Ojas Joshi ghatam
Shannon Johnson violin
Eric Breton djembe, carcabou, shakers
Jeremiah McDade soprano sax
Solon McDade upright bass