By Sandra Renew. This poem is part of our December 2012 and January 2013 focus on Asylum Seekers.
In the moment he decides to go
he knows….
He knows that if he does not go
he will be killed.
He knows that when he leaves the desert and high mountains
he can never go back.
He knows that he is a boy in a faded shirt, carrying a broken-zipped bag, and that when he arrives,
if he arrives,
he will be a man.
He knows, in the moment he decides to go, that
he has to take a chance
on drowning,
take a chance
on surviving,
take a chance
on arriving,
take a chance
on passing scrutiny.
In the moment he decides to go
he knows that he will have to endure.
He knows that through all the temporary arrivals,
in all the overcrowded transit camps,
all the false hopes raised,
and long years of finding his way
to dubious safe houses
in myriad unwelcoming, foreign countries,
he has to endure.
In the moment he decides to go
he knows
that when he steps on board the old wooden fishing boat,
his broken-zipped bag in hand,
the engine faltering and the helmsman
blustering unlikely, expensive promises,
he knows he has to take a chance,
he knows he has to endure,
he knows he is no longer a boy.
In the moment he decides to go
he knows
he can never go back.
