“They are the ones who broke the law, they are the ones who endangered their own children on their trek. The United States on the other hand, goes to extraordinary lengths to protect them while the parents go through a short detention period.”
– Jeff Sessions
excerpt from “Cajas/Boxes of Zero Tolerance”
They are the ones who were told their children
were taken to bathe—and not returned. They
are the ones whose nursing babies and toddlers
were forced to wean and left in wet diapers.
And their other young ones also cried
for mami, for papá, for tía, for ____
and were told they were an orchestra without
a conductor. And enough in this country
elected the conductor with his fist
in the air, without music, without ocean,
without moon, without the very earth. He
was the one and she another and he yet
another who said they’d be taking her child
the next day and said “Happy Mother’s Day.”
by Emmy Pérez
from Split This Rock