What Rough Beast | Poem for August 5, 2017

Lori Lamothe
Dear Refugee

marked revoked or canceled,
subject to severability, authority,
Homeland torture and report—
Dear Life,
Do not come here to create light,
that excess suspension of burdens.
Do not seek to travel past
proper borders or to heighten
our hundreds of thousands of tree miles.
Dear Child,
Dear Infant,
Dear Individual,
Leave us instead to enforce
crucial narrow procedures
identified as normal.
Leave us in violence
to keep the world safe
for previously established categories.
truly,
the President

 

AUTHOR’S NOTE: “Dear Refugee” is a found poem taken from Donald Trump’s “Executive Order Protecting The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States” signed on March 6, 2017. The only word I’ve added is dear.

 

Lori Lamothe is the author of three poetry collections, Kirlian Effect (FutureCycle Press, 2017), Happily (Aldrich Press, 2015) and Trace Elements (Aldrich Press, 2014). Her poems have appeared in Blackbird, Kettle Blue Review, The Journal, Painted Bride Quarterly, Verse Daily and elsewhere.

 

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