Poem
Maria Jastrzębska
Think About It
Think About It
Think About It
How do you thinkI got here? Blown in
on a yellowing leaf? Do you think
we seeped into your cities
or your suburbs with the rain?
How do you think it happened?
Do you think we rode
the backs of waves, shattering —
flotsam jetsam against white cliffs?
Or did we spring out of the earth
from seeds you’d sown
and then forgotten.
Every one of us came here
for a reason. Ask
your ministers, your generals.
Ask them what treaties they signed
ask what they bartered and stole
what game they used us for.
Or will you go on thinking
we simply fell out of the sky
and that is why we smoulder still?
© 2004, Maria Jastrzębska
From: Syrena
Publisher: Redbeck Press, Bradford
From: Syrena
Publisher: Redbeck Press, Bradford
Maria Jastrzębska
(Poland, 1953)
Maria Jastrzębska was born in Warsaw in 1953 and came to England as a small child when her family escaped from Poland. She studied Developmental Psychology at Sussex University and lives in Brighton. Her early work was popularised by the women’s presses and magazines of the 1980s and 1990s. Her poem ‘The Good Immigrant’ was used by teachers in schools and colleges. Her work has appeared in ant...
Poems
Poems of Maria Jastrzębska
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Think About It
How do you thinkI got here? Blown in
on a yellowing leaf? Do you think
we seeped into your cities
or your suburbs with the rain?
How do you think it happened?
Do you think we rode
the backs of waves, shattering —
flotsam jetsam against white cliffs?
Or did we spring out of the earth
from seeds you’d sown
and then forgotten.
Every one of us came here
for a reason. Ask
your ministers, your generals.
Ask them what treaties they signed
ask what they bartered and stole
what game they used us for.
Or will you go on thinking
we simply fell out of the sky
and that is why we smoulder still?
From: Syrena
Think About It
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