Month: May 2023

I wished the better for my native land, ah!
I wished her wiser rule and fairer wage
And honesty and peace and fearless speech,
I gave my voice and vote and signature.
And so my native country smashed my teeth
And hung me like a flute to play for screams
And shot my child and disappeared my wife
And I on concrete lay for seven years,
Kept sleepless by my dreams of what I’d do
With every morning of that stolen life,
Escaped, unlike some others, stumbled out
And bribed and begged my way from month to month
Through lands as blank to me as I to them,
Trudging and limping, dodging border guards,
Sleeping in ditches, sneezing, eating snow,
And paid my last to fall into a boat
That tossed like paper in the drenching wakes
Of ships that towered past us in the night,
And crawled ashore on Britain, that free land, ah!
Britain, whose ancient generosity
Had fertilized her talents and her blood,
Whose minds had clarified the rights of man.
Here might I rest and heal, forgive the world,
Repay my welcomers with useful work,
Even reach home to find and save my love,
And taste at last that sugar, happiness.
No. Britain growing old had shrunk and stiffened,
Had lost the liberal brightness of her eye,
Loved not her neighbor, scorned the Golden Rule,
And Britain said: You have no Document.
You came without permission, and this proves
You have not suffered and do not require
Asylum. Back you go to where you fled,
Whose officers will greet you as you land, ah!
You balk? Then here’s your ticket, no return,
Five thousand miles, to tropic Africa–
By God, we’ll make you fear to try again!
Don’t argue, it’s an Act, there’s no appeal.
Get lost, fuck off, heraus, scram, imshi, anda!
Put out your wrists and ankles to be shackled.
What are these scars, you tried to off yourself?
You’ll live your days out in a micro land,
Poor, densely peopled, stained by genocide.
Her regimen will make you feel at home.
You may have heard of her. Her name is Rwanda.