“no one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city running as well

your neighbors running faster than you
breath bloody in their throats
the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory
is holding a gun bigger than his body
you only leave home
when home won’t let you stay.

no one leaves home unless home chases you
fire under feet
hot blood in your belly
it’s not something you ever thought of doing
until the blade burnt threats into
your neck
and even then you carried the anthem under
your breath
only tearing up your passport in an airport toilets
sobbing as each mouthful of paper
made it clear that you wouldn’t be going back.

you have to understand,
that no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land
no one burns their palms
under trains
beneath carriages
no one spends days and nights in the stomach of a truck
feeding on newspaper unless the miles travelled
means something more than journey.
no one crawls under fences
no one wants to be beaten
pitied

no one chooses refugee camps
or strip searches where your
body is left aching
or prison,
because prison is safer
than a city of fire
and one prison guard
in the night
is better than a truckload
of men who look like your father
no one could take it
no one could stomach it
no one skin would be tough enough

the
go home blacks
refugees
dirty immigrants
asylum seekers
sucking our country dry
niggers with their hands out
they smell strange
savage
messed up their country and now they want
to mess ours up
how do the words
the dirty looks
roll off your backs
maybe because the blow is softer
than a limb torn off

or the words are more tender
than fourteen men between
your legs
or the insults are easier
to swallow
than rubble
than bone
than your child body
in pieces.
i want to go home,
but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home told you
to quicken your legs
leave your clothes behind
crawl through the desert
wade through the oceans
drown
save
be hunger
beg
forget pride
your survival is more important

no one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your ear
saying-
leave,
run away from me now
i dont know what i’ve become
but i know that anywhere
is safer than here” – Warsan Shire

I chose this poem because not only does it relate to displacement but my research topic paper as well. In this poem the poet basically discusses how he feels displaced in his own home; country. He doesn’t feel safe there, along with everyone else living there. They are all running away from home in search of a safer place where opportunities are surrounded by. This poem struck me the most because this is reality. This is what people are going through right now. This is why we have so many immigrants and refugees in the United States because those that are living in Central America feel displaced in their own home. They rather anything but there and it is unfortunate that our president isn’t so welcoming when it comes to them. We need to do something as a whole to help these people get out of danger, and seek better life opportunities. We need to figure out why are they experiencing this and what can we do to make it better.

“Immunity at the cost
Of false patriotism.
Immunity at the cost of
A heart… a life.

“You’re doing God’s work, Son.”
You hear as you march.
March in to the pit of ****** and blindness.
“He had a gun!” You cry.
“He was only a child.” I reply.

You take validity out of the words of the oppressed.
You take money from the pockets of the poor.
How many memories must you repress
To feel empowered enough,
to drop the innocent to the floor?”

This is a poem by Adam DeRosa. The reason as to why I chose this poem is because it’s related to black lives matter. For many years black people have felt displaced in their own country, state, borough and neighborhood! They have felt uncomfortable when it comes to the local policemen because they have been taking people’s lives for no reason. They have been getting random searches, stopped in the street or in their own car, and attacked, all for reasons of their color skin, looking “suspicious” and false accusations. They have felt displaced because they feel they do not belong due to the superiority and power of the white policemen. Innocent lives have been taken back to back for no apparent reason without justice being served and there needs to be a stop to it to prevent innocent lives being killed, and so they wont feel displaced in their own homes.

Gentrification doesn’t necessarily benefit the people who are from that specific community due to the increase in the cost of living.

As I was reading Interpreter of Maladies the first thing I observed was how the author made it clear that Mr. and Mrs. Das are a young married couple. The way it was mentioned that they aren’t even in their thirties yet gave off the impression, to me as the reader, that they were married young and maybe don’t have the relationship they want to have. It is clear that Mr. Kapasi and Mrs. Das do have a strange relationship being that Mrs. Das is a married woman. For some reason she feels comfortable open up to him about her son not belonging to her husband which isn’t something a married woman just shares. In my opinion she does this to let him know she did have an affair to show the kind of woman she is. It’s clear that they are flirting and she wanted him to know her clear intentions.

1. Moving from my old home that I lived in for 14 years to my new place now.

2. Luquillo in Puerto Rico is a meaningful place for me.

3. The way my highschool shaped me in many ways. I’ve been there since I was in 6th grade.

1. How would you feel if you were in Aciman’s position?
2. Do you think Aciman is only hurting himself by trying to mourn Straus Park and relive the past?
3. Why do you think the article was named “Shadow Cities”?