Liminal People: A Memory of Refugees

Liminal People
(On the Meaning of Territory)

Once, I found it normal to pass frontiers;
People in rags waiting on one side
and on the other men with guns...
It made you open your eyes wide
and utter curses of awe...
these people who would soon be dead
so a nation could live
and all the ambitions of that imagined reality
could seem sane...

... and you must only think it is the nation
that dreams the liminal reality
of the people.

Jerry Monaco
New York City
2004

The above was inspired by a poem by William Empson -- who would have not understood how I got from his inspiration to this poem.

also see Shandean Postscripts to Politics and Culture

Link