A Mother in a Refugee Camp / Chinua Achebe

No Madonna and Child could touch
Her tenderness for a son
She soon would have to forget. . . .
The air was heavy with odors of diarrhea,
Of unwashed children with washed-out ribs
And dried-up bottoms waddling in labored steps
Behind blown-empty bellies. Other mothers there
Had long ceased to care, but not this one:
She held a ghost-smile between her teeth,
And in her eyes the memory
Of a mother’s pride. . . .She had bathed him
And rubbed him down with bare palms.
She took from their bundle of possessions
A broken comb and combed
The rust-colored hair left on his skull
And then—humming in her eyes—began carefully to part it.
In their former life this was perhaps
A little daily act of no consequence
Before his breakfast and school; now she did it
Like putting flowers on a tiny grave.

(Note: Chinua Achebe (d. 2013) was one of the foremost writer in
 post-colonial Africa; though Achebe chose to write primarily in 
English - "the language of colonisers". He is also counted among
 the leading novelists with high praises for his 1958 breakout
 novel 'Things Fall Apart'.)