[Ann Drysdale]

Thanks Ralph and RogerBob. This was written in the first few days after the boat tragedy, a way of coming to terms with the powerful feelings the overnight change of headline photograph generated.

The little one was "Aylan" then (phonetically copied?). I thought about changing it retrospectively to "Alan" after I heard an interview with his father explaining he'd been named after a footballer but decided not to. The whole point was that I was reflecting the editorial reality at the time. It matters to me that the poem should remain true to its moment. And to Ghalib.

Thus it has stayed as it was written and Twitter will stay Twitter; it will not become X. Let posterity do the research, eh?

Meanwhile - more wars, other pictures...
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