HOME by Warsan Shire
no one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city running as well
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city running as well
your neighbors running faster than you
breath bloody in their throats
the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory
is holding a gun bigger than his body
you only leave home
when home won’t let you stay.
breath bloody in their throats
the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory
is holding a gun bigger than his body
you only leave home
when home won’t let you stay.
no one leaves home unless home chases you
fire under feet
hot blood in your belly
it’s not something you ever thought of doing
until the blade burnt threats into
your neck
and even then you carried the anthem under
your breath
only tearing up your passport in an airport toilets
sobbing as each mouthful of paper
made it clear that you wouldn’t be going back.
fire under feet
hot blood in your belly
it’s not something you ever thought of doing
until the blade burnt threats into
your neck
and even then you carried the anthem under
your breath
only tearing up your passport in an airport toilets
sobbing as each mouthful of paper
made it clear that you wouldn’t be going back.
you have to understand,
that no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land
no one burns their palms
under trains
beneath carriages
no one spends days and nights in the stomach of a truck
feeding on newspaper unless the miles travelled
means something more than journey.
no one crawls under fences
no one wants to be beaten
pitied
that no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land
no one burns their palms
under trains
beneath carriages
no one spends days and nights in the stomach of a truck
feeding on newspaper unless the miles travelled
means something more than journey.
no one crawls under fences
no one wants to be beaten
pitied
no one chooses refugee camps
or strip searches where your
body is left aching
or prison,
because prison is safer
than a city of fire
and one prison guard
in the night
is better than a truckload
of men who look like your father
no one could take it
no one could stomach it
no one skin would be tough enough
or strip searches where your
body is left aching
or prison,
because prison is safer
than a city of fire
and one prison guard
in the night
is better than a truckload
of men who look like your father
no one could take it
no one could stomach it
no one skin would be tough enough
the
go home blacks
refugees
dirty immigrants
asylum seekers
sucking our country dry
niggers with their hands out
they smell strange
savage
messed up their country and now they want
to mess ours up
how do the words
the dirty looks
roll off your backs
maybe because the blow is softer
than a limb torn off
go home blacks
refugees
dirty immigrants
asylum seekers
sucking our country dry
niggers with their hands out
they smell strange
savage
messed up their country and now they want
to mess ours up
how do the words
the dirty looks
roll off your backs
maybe because the blow is softer
than a limb torn off
or the words are more tender
than fourteen men between
your legs
or the insults are easier
to swallow
than rubble
than bone
than your child body
in pieces.
i want to go home,
but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home told you
to quicken your legs
leave your clothes behind
crawl through the desert
wade through the oceans
drown
save
be hunger
beg
forget pride
your survival is more important
than fourteen men between
your legs
or the insults are easier
to swallow
than rubble
than bone
than your child body
in pieces.
i want to go home,
but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home told you
to quicken your legs
leave your clothes behind
crawl through the desert
wade through the oceans
drown
save
be hunger
beg
forget pride
your survival is more important
no one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your ear
saying-
leave,
run away from me now
i dont know what i’ve become
but i know that anywhere
is safer than here
saying-
leave,
run away from me now
i dont know what i’ve become
but i know that anywhere
is safer than here
I decide to spend a few days in recovery mode, giving a term to doing nothing because I don't have a plan, so I find a small hostel off the beaten path in an authentic neighbourhood with small kids playing in the streets and shopkeepers who greet me by name - assuming Canada counts as my name - and the transition from frenetic tourist to total calm is lovely. There's a tiny cafeteria nearby that serves excellent Turkish food almost exclusively to locals. And a nice park with a huge fountain, many benches, and lots of trees. I even start going out and about without my camera. Best of all I have time to talk, and walk, and read, and think, though, to be fair, I'm better at the first three than the latter.
The term 'single serving friend' has been around since 1999 when coined in the movie Fight Club. Travelling on one's own one, staying in hostels, one makes many such short term connections, if connection is even an appropriate word.
For example, at breakfast today I sat with a 40ish Turkish man who had recently had a failed attempt to emigrate to Argentina and was back in Turkey regrouping before trying again. We spent a very congenial hour discussing human population movements through the ages; he told me all about the ancient Turkish migration from the edge of China to the edge of Europe, about the populating of Argentina with Europeans, why he wants to emigrate...
For example, I am sharing a room with two girls who choose to share a bed. I noticed their eyebrows were identical and asked if they were sisters traveling together. It turns out they are the same ages as Fred and Alex and when I showed them a pic of my boys traveling we became tight (for single serving friends that is!) and I even became facebook friends with one of them (though, really, only to be polite, as it is not my practice to add anyone I'm not likely to stay in contact with to my Facebook list) and now they talk to me all the time (all of us using Google translate on our phones to communicate). They are the 2 eldest of 10 kids; 9 girls, and, finally, a boy.
I have yet to decide what value beyond general interest there is to meeting so many diverse people. I feel if I were brighter I could distil the impressions they leave and write a fantastic essay about it all. (Of this I am sure however; new people can be fascinating, fun even, but they could never replace relationships with real friends and family. So... a huge thank you to all my non ssf's out there who drop me a line from time to time, there's nothing like meeting a lot of new people to make you value those you'll always know!)
My favourite new poet is Warsan Shire who I found by reading about Donald Trump which I did after talking to a young Mexican author who is worried about the 'real wall' between the US and Mexico. There are visible Syrian refugees here, usually sitting right on the pavement as if they somehow don't even merit the public benches, and the above poem seems very relevant. Two million Syrian refugees in Turkey the papers say. I research the walls being built throughout Europe and then go to look again at the one Constantine had built 1500 years ago. It stands 12 m high, withstood many battles and even the coming of gunpowder, and protected the city for almost a millennia. The Great Wall of China was started over a thousand years before that even and has a total length of 21 000 km including its branches. So wars and migrating peoples and walls built to keep out rebels or refugees are not new phenomena. I am fascinated by the fact that the rich Arabic countries are taking in zero refugees and I am wondering about the (likely future) clash of religions in Europe and I read about the 1923 Greek Turkish population exchange. Perhaps because I am female I feel the real answers to today's issues likely have more to do with economic policy than physical structures (though please, and sorry, I have no clue what exactly those might be).
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| Constantine's wall: Trump that Donald! |
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| Total aside: I like that the moats are now vegetable gardens. |
Above all I am grateful that I was lucky enough to be born with a Canadian passport.
