Disposable.

I refuse to believe
that the only choice this country has
is to separate families.

I refuse to believe
that the only choice this country has
is to isolate babies
and to cage toddlers, children and teens
in barbed wire boxes.

I refuse to condemn parents for
trying to bring their children
to a place where they hope
to find
safety and hope
for their future.

These are people.
Just people.
Like me and you
and us.

What is happening to these people
is a warning sign.

Any government that is able to brainwash its citizens,
into believing that protecting this country means
tearing families apart
and inflicting permanent emotional and physical harm
on infants, toddlers, children and teens

is a government that will come for you next.

For me next.

What random power-fueled excuse will it be
when the next round-up is called?

Who will they next train their eye upon?
Which of us in in their way?

Professors and teachers perhaps for teaching history and reason,
for training young minds to think critically and deeply,
for nurturing new ideas and new voices?

Writers, artists and creators perhaps
for giving word, voice and form,
exposing the truth and
fanning imagination and hope?

Who will be next?

America has been here before,
it has stood on this doorstep
of intolerance and atrocity.

We know what it looks like
and we know the generations of
pain that follow.

The US has done this all before,
the circumstances both different and similar:

Native Americans.
Slaves.
Japanese-Americans.
Muslims.

Chinese Exclusion Act.
School segregation.
The Civil Rights movement.
Women's rights.
LGBTQIA+ rights.
So many others...

We watched it happen in other countries,
in Nazi Germany.

We condemned what was happening
"over there"
 brazenly confident in our
great American democracy,
so sure
that it wouldn't be us.

And yet it has always been us.

Human history--
US history--
is awash with a river of
what were seen as "disposable people"--
people who were different,
people who were OTHER.

People who were seen as  standing in the way
of whatever was defined as "good" and "proper".


But I ask you,
at what point are any of us
ANY OF US
safe from becoming
disposable?