1) February 22, 2017: Mexican man kills
himself after being deported from US
The bus rattles through the dusty
hills of the Honduran highlands near the border,
he says:
I am
making a life here now…
but I wish I could go back and tell them
not to get tattoos.
Back home, you know these guys.
You grow up in LA and everyone is inked all over.
He runs his hands
up and down his flannel sleeved arms, and continues to smile.
It doesn’t mean anything.
His hands slip
under his armpits and he looks away briefly, his eyes blink.
They don’t know that here in Honduras, in
El Salvador…
he turns to me
sternly
They think if you got a tattoo, you ran
with the gang, it doesn’t matter which.
You’re a threat to them, they’re gonna take you out.
You might not even last a day off the bus.
One guy, maybe 25 or 26, just a young guy
like you, a father…
he shakes his
head.
They
cut him up in front of them… It’s not like home.
he
shakes his head.
He wasn’t a criminal or nothing,
just unlucky.
He just got snatched up one day while he
was working.
2) February 15, 2017: A mother
of four … has taken refuge in a Denver church
I remember being caught off guard by the way
the band raised their voices, strummed just a little bit louder at her memorial
service, -to mask the wailing of her children…
a not so subtle
assurance to the grieving,
to not be ashamed of their heartache.
…and extra
tears shed for those who -couldn’t be there.
His missing cries. His missing arms
that should have been consoling them.
The
missing polished shoes he’d have scuffed on the wooden legs of the pews,
-the ill-fitting dark
suit hunched over in his own mourning.
I clenched my teeth to still my stomach of guilt, and looked
away.
There was a waste basket in the
corner, vacant of all the dampened tissues of the vanished.
It didn’t need to be said, there are no assuring words or melodic
pitch,
-that can ever soothe
such injustice.
3) Feb 18, 2017: Woman arrested while
seeking domestic violence help
My Mother, and my sisters and the coyote…
She starts to describe her journey
across the desert, I tighten my brow in concern. I am a 22- year-old child, but
I know where this is going… and she is so innocent, so much younger, and I
force myself not to tear up at the thought of it.
It took a long time… it was
very hot, and very hard to walk with my little sister crying.
Someone interrupts and asks what a
coyote is, and she clarifies
I don’t know the word…
they are the ones who take you across the
border.
And
we nod solemnly recalling images of human traffickers, vile slavers, heartless
criminals taking advantage of the powerless. Every story ends with someone left
to the inhumane wastelands. Forced into drug gangs. Unmarked graves. Tattered
skirts hugging sun bleached bones in the desert breeze.
…and on one of the final
nights, we stayed in these caves. We
were so scared, very nervous but excited that we were almost here, almost… home.
My stomach drops, but
I pretend that I’ve been wanting to hear any of this... reminding myself that
to bear witness, to listen, is a necessary discomfort.
-she sees the
subtle grit I’ve reserved, and knowing me, smiles her brightest smile.
-for a brief second,
it stabs-
Don’t worry, this is a story about my… angel. she blinks a few times too rapidly.
I don’t understand how anything good can come of the horror
running through my mind, but she collects herself and returns to the story.
He was very protective, our guide. We knew it was dangerous, but that
night he came to me… a blurriness hits my eyes.
and he pulled me and my sisters and my mother
aside…
and he hid us… from them.
She didn’t say what happened next,
but the gratitude
of salvation streamed down her cheeks…
And we each said a silent prayer thanking God for the
courage of a criminal.
4) February 21, 2017: ICE to expand
deportations
The President of the organization I work at
is on the phone asking the same question that has been keeping me up every
night. There is whispering between the desks, we feel it creeping across our
skin.
I can’t hear the voice on the other side of the phone but I know the
answer
is not enough.
The poster on the wall displays our people,
their quotes describing how this place feels like family, like home. Their
stories run through my mind, their smiles, their gifts, their welcoming
invitation to join the family they’ve created.
We
remind them in the self-assured voices of professionals that if the worst
happens they should be silent to protect themselves. The concern in our eyes is
not enough.
We march through the streets with
banners calling out injustice, calling for understanding. We voice our concerns
to the press. We sign petitions and give
money in one time gifts, that become repeated contributions as the horror
stories become routine.
Each headline a
daily reminder that it is not enough.
5) March 6, 2017: Trump’s new travel ban
blocks migrants
I am listening to the radio as:
a man states that Congress has
given the President the authority to block,
any person or group.
To keep them from coming here. It’s too much so I turn it off.
a woman describes a boy being
thrown off the train, how the wind sucks them into the wheels. She says my
taxes pay to keep their tiny bodies from coming here. It’s too much so I turn it off.
some spitting mouth enthuses over
the progress of the wall.
I turn it off.
some
monotone sulks about the increasing drought in the war-torn land.
I turn it off.
some foreign Brit drones about the
American Sikh shot and told to go back.
I
turn it off.
some buzzing journalist muses on
the language of the ban.
I turn it off.
some northern accent picks at the
increased traffic at the border.
I turn it off.
some men
lose their fingers fleeing in terror:
I turn it off,
but not before I hear they were fleeing from here.
From my
home.
6) Today: Are these headlines our home?
this deprived fortress of
buffered walls,
this barren
shelter to retreat, where we swallow our daily guilt,
fearful of others’ need…
flaunting
self-protection, divested in care,
secured, with paranoid
spears ever outwardly cast
hiding behind the
locks on our doors claiming no impact
Or
is our home
a place that despite our fears, we
dare
to entrust a stranger
with our stories…
grateful and
proud enough to share
with our doors cast wide open in
welcome,
our arms wide so we can greet them,
our ears open to listen,
our hearts transformed
because without
them,
we’ve lost, everything.
