Plus - Letter to the editor

They came and they came

By F. J. Silva

They came
On foot
On shoulders
In arms
In rickety boats
In a mini-Dunkirk.

In ones
In families
what remains of
In groups
In thousands

Limping they came
Running they came
Bleeding they came
Dying they came
Alive they came
Crying they came
Laughing they came

Past the barriers
Past the mounds
Who succumbed
For whose well-being?
Questioning they came
Uncowed by the bullets
Aimed at their feet.

Through the breaches
Bunds built by hands
The children, the aged, the sick
The hapless expendables
To preserve a deception.

Through scorching sand
Through sticky mud pits
Chilly waters neck deep
Running the gauntlet
Out of the cesspit.

I watched with tearful eyes
They come in
To the arms of a caring Nation.

 
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