What lies on distant shores,

Buckets, pigeon holes, troughs for segregation.

Language, dress, birthplace do not an enemy make.

Where came this bitter misdirection?

Religion, culture, song, dance,

These are things of man’s creation.

Strip naked man and woman–

Lay them bare of their mortal inventions.

Confiscate their language, dress, birthplace,

Expropriate their religion, culture, song, dance,

Take all they have of this world;

What have they left?

Blood and skin and bone;

That which crumbles with inevitable death.

Hopes and dreams, emotions;

intangibles that define humanness.

Air, food, water, shelter;

That which sustains us.

Boundaries of man hold no sway over these.

We are but one species,

Born and consumed in life,

Until the day we return home

To the dust from whence we came.

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~