WEDNESDAY 27th MAY 2009.

The streets are awash with strangers these days,
And it’s not their fault they are seen that way,
After all we look unfamiliar to them
And we have always lived here;
In between the rain and drains,
Riding the road and trying to remember
Why we never sought its freedom.

Keeping an ageless faith in our heirlooms,
Even though we’ve sold their size for more rooms,
All the while advising visitors that their worth
Could never be replaced,
Until one with the right price
Happens by to provide his money’s services,
And our memories are erased.

So give the land to immigration’s shore;
It knows the value of a shelter’s walls,
And will not take for granted the handed batons
Of a generation’s efforts,
Or drop them for offerings
More transient, and ultimately patterned
By a tribe's short sightedness.