Moon at Half Past Noon

It did not spring up in a single, stark night,
This thicket that blocks out the sun.
We planted the seed with a carefully muttered slight,
And called it a duty done.

We fed it the compost of historical slights,
The rich, rotting manure of old fears.
We watered its roots with our long, sleepless nights,
And nursed it with unshed tears.

Its roots are not shallow; they grip the deep stone
Of the stories we tell of our name.
They tangle with memories we claim as our own,
Till the soil and the sorrow are the same.

And oh, how it flourished, a grotesque, lovely thing,
With blossoms of perfidious scent,
That promised a purity only it could bring,
And a wall that was heaven-sent.

But a plant that is fed upon venomous fare,
Does not bear a fruit that is sweet.
Its thorns are the laws that we write with great care,
Its pollen, the hate that we meet.

Its branches are rifles and razor-wire strands,
Its sap is a poisonous creed.
It offers its shade to the willingest hands,
And flowers from a terrible seed.

So what do we do with this garden of spite,
That we’ve tended so faithfully, long?
How do we unlearn the embrace of its night,
And silence its twisted, sweet song?

For the wall is not concrete, nor iron, nor stone,
But a living, defended, deep need.
The most terrifying border we’ll ever have known
Is the one we planted, and watered, from a forgotten, bitter seed.

We stand in its shadow, complaining of cold,
While clutching the watering can tight.
The story of “Us” is the story we’ve told,
But the “Them” is what we grow in the dark.
And we are the gardeners of this perpetual night.