Unfurling People (Monday Poem)

by Elizabeth Acevedo


People leave their homes
even when they love their homes
because people are like flowers:
and sometimes, the places where we live
do not have enough to water us all,
or they have enough sunlight,
but it's being used to scorch us;
or the soil is fertile, but those who tend it
want to pluck us straight out
before we've grown to our full potential.
And so, immigration is like tucking your roots
carefully into yourself
and repotting in a different land.

Immigration is an attempt to 
bloom and blossom
and brighten a new place
with the colors and scents
you've brought with you.
IT is an attempt to remember
where you are from, and the place that made you,
and also unfurl to the possibilities
of the new place you call home.

Immigration is learning to stretch
into a bridge,
backward and forward,
one limb in each place,
learning to hold tight to traditions
and customs and names and memories in one hand,
and with the other hand let go and lean in
to a place you hope will see you
for all the beauty that you bring.




from Woke: A Young People's Call to Justice 
by Mahogany L. Browne, 
illustrated by Theodore Taylor III
Roaring Brook Press, 2020