a photo, a poem

Instructions for Identifying All Immigrants
(Official Document for the Racist)

for Jan Brewer

1. consider moving through desert,
the beveled preface to home:

the crowns
& field stones

littered.

2. Consider the nature
of skin, the hues of

departure: the immigrant will be
the tint of the Gulf,

dried leaves amongst owl eggs,

whiskey-songs
& cradles of lacquered oak.

3. Consider the white body as passport,
as yours the legal right, will to power;

the textured immigrant as violation,
immolation (they all are immigrant).

4. Consider brown as bastard,
Spanish as syntax discardable;

Recall you are

homeland
& formal choice.

5. Forget your neighbor
as yourself, for theirs

is the serpent-tongue coiled through accent

around baskets full
of tender oranges.

6. Consider the commodity of your Nationalism,
country as your manufactured product:
recall your skin is the plastic credit
card your tongue.

Card their tongue,
recall their body is the plastic credit
you purchase as your manufactured product;
Consider their Nationalism as your commodity.

J. Michael Martinez