Invite the woman
who lost her husband
in the flickering hands

of flame. And the man
whose arm was chewed up
by a jaw of shrapnel.

And the colonel
whose son strapped himself
to the ceiling fan and took

a breezy leap of faith.
And the father who croons
lullabies for his five-year-old

as buckshot spackles
the window pane, Have each
prepare a few words

about suffering, but make sure
each ends by testifying
that my woes put

their woes in perspective,
that my woes are, in fact,
the measuring stick.