“Get him! Get him”, heard yelled across the roadblock, as red-brake lights
Lit up the night scene, with cars waiting in line to be checked
By ICE officers geared up for battle with some unforeseen enemy
And his name was Ruben and he was just twenty-three that night
Riding around with a friend on South Padre Island in Texas, yet they were suspect
His friend said they told them to turn around but being brown led to the officers’ zealotry
And three shots rang out in the balmy ocean air
While they pulled Ruben lifeless to the ground, cuffing him there
Never bothering to ask if he was American or for an ID
The body camera footage, all the proof needed, eventually calling help for an ambulance there
Chaos ensuing amidst automobile lights’ bright glares
But really, thinking about it, Ruben was just a kid
And so, with more thought, I do not think Nero could have done a better job
In burning Rome and blaming it on the innocents
Or, even thinking about Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Wherein the Native survives and the wardens of the mental asylum
Are more insane than the inmates
What is this lunacy in our nation, a kind of rampant lynch mob
What are they searching for, all apparent dissidents
Panicking people all around and giving really everyone unrest
What deep offence for the many over a few some
Immigrant officials acting more like non-human primates
Why are ICE agents so untrained and so unable to differentiate
And being trigger-happy in the moment
Can they not ask for a license or identification
And differentiate between Americans and so-called illegals
By just concentrating on peoples’ phenotypes
Seeing camera images again, a scene for us to recreate
A kind of flagrant looking for an opponent
What is this sickness now in our nation
We are after all a nation of mostly immigrant peoples
And understanding race a fiction, and we’re more alike through our genotypes
Isn’t it enough we put Native Americans on reservations
Can we not have better aspirations
For our immigrant selves
And be hyphenated Americans and again incorporate ourselves
Can we not do better
Do we have to pin our brown sisters and brethren with a scarlet letter