The Barbarians are Coming
War chariots thunder, horses neigh, the barbarians are coming.
What are we waiting for, young nubile women pointing at the wall,
the barbarians are coming.
They have heard about a weakened link in the wall.
So, the barbarians have ears among us.
So deceive yourself with illusions: you are only one woman,
holding one broken brick in the wall.
So deceive yourself with illusions: as if you matter,
that brick and that wall.
The barbarians are coming: they have red beards or beardless
with a top knot.
The barbarians are coming: they are your fathers, brothers,
teachers, lovers; and they are clearly an other.
The barbarians are coming:
If you call me a horse, I must be a horse.
If you call me a bison, I am equally as guilty.
When a thing is true and is correctly described, one doubles
the blame by not admitting it: so, Chuangtzu, himself,
was a barbarian king!
Horse, horse, bison, bison, the barbarians are coming—
and how they love to come.
The smells of the great frontier exalt in them!
by Marilyn Chin
from Modern American Poetry