DROWNED

Staunching the tide of migrants
With walls and razor wire and guns
Those in power care not for the weak

Forgotten is the “beacon on the hill”
Forgotten is the call “Give me your tired, your poor…” 

A mother and her two children 
Cross the Rio Grande River
In search of a better life
What they are fleeing fuels their desperation

Razor wire greets them

Soldiers look on as they falter
and slip below the muddy current
Drowned

A sense of outrage streams through the body politic
Blame gets passed around

And then distracted 
The public moves on
The mother and children forgotten
Drowned by other news

Mary Janicke is a gardener and writer living in Texas. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, USA Today, Pulse, Pure Slush, Green Ink, Honeyguide, Blue Lake Review, and elsewhere.