Who’s Next, Oh America

I wrote this poem after reading Homeland Elegies by Ayad Akhtar and On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong.

Oh America

Our living Democracy.

First it was the black

Whose color was wrong.

Then the Japanese whose faces

Wore  the enemy’s.

After 9/11, it was the Moslems.

All Asians after Covid-19

Since we all look alike.

Oh America,

Hear this, before you etch

Another on your list:

The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Oh America,

Who’s next on your list?

frances h kakugawa

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