“Tired of migrants arriving from Africa, the E.U. has created a shadow immigration system that captures them before they reach its shores…” – The New Yorker

I want to be braver than I am, and fitter.
Swimming far out to sea,
I’d dip my body in the moon’s glitter,
muscles stroking powerfully,
And rescue you amidst deep-sea foam,
far, far from the lying bay.

I’d scoop the waters with raisined hands,
casting for love far out to sea,
And reel you in from poisoned lands.
I too am poisoned, you see:
There’s lead in my blood, and hate,
a heaviness drowning me.

Ballad of the broken promise! Ballad
of the hot and rising sea!
I dive, I leap, I grow cold and pallid
waiting for you to rescue me.
An angry sun lurks, and sharks begin
to circle hungrily.

How dare you eat and drink the salt
of the hot and rising sea!
Are you a God? Pray, whose fault
that here dies a refugee?
Stop this dreadful ballad of the lie!
We are unalike, you and me:

You are neither brave nor fit.
You abhor the deep-blue sea.
Innocent, who will acquit
those who look like me?
Liars all, you pay off the sharks
that murder us with glee.