Stranger You Can't Enter Here
Jerry T. Johnson
​
Stranger

you can’t enter here
i broke the knob i changed the locks
after Squanto, Massasoit, Pocahontas, the Powaton
and other native nations’

let me in
not only did i go in
but i held the door open
for the slave traders
i held the door open
for the massas of the big house
i held the door open for the taskmaster
these were the true rapists
the true commissars of murder
and cruel and brutal assault
yes i held the door open
and i closed my eyes to atrocity

Later

i waged war against the Lakota
when i heard there was gold in the
Black Hills
i assassinated Crazy Horse
when he sought to make peace
Sitting Bull i slew at the massacres
of Wounded Knee and like a mad armed robber
i stole native soil in the throes of my greed

Moreover

when Big Jim Crow was authorized
by The 1877 Compromise to run wild
blood flowed into river after river after river
and when the cries of the terrorized
were lifted high i closed my eyes
and then i closed my ears

Afterwards

i built a tall statue in New York harbor
i kept that door open for those of my own color
i kept that door open for those of my own kin

Now Stranger

from across the realms of the Rio Grande you emerge
seeking refuge from deadly poverty and deadly hurt

Stranger

there is no torch bearing statue waiting
to greet you at the river’s edge
only gun bearing sheriffs, deputies, border guards
and a steel fenced ledge

i labeled you with the moniker of criminal
i separated your mothers from their daughters
i separated your fathers from their sons
i slammed the door shut to emigres from the west

you can’t enter here
i broke the knob i changed the locks
after Squanto, Massasoit, Pocahontas,
the Powaton and other native nations’
let me in

after all that i have done to you
your beauty continues to glow’
and the pride i once bore now waxes
frail as my prowess wears thin
​
i am calloused by my bruised conscious
i am consumed by my own hatred
i am frozen in place by my coldness
i am withered away by my own sins