That Place You Don’t Belong

Before we begin: Please bear with me through the voiceover. At the time I was recording this, I had a bit of a cold.

I wrote this poem after they detained Kilmar Abrego García. I am only just starting to find the words and process everything we’ve seen and experienced before that day and since.

Back then, I don’t think I even had a Substack. What I wrote, I wrote to feel and process. I shared with family and friends. I didn’t think anyone would care about the things I wrote or that it would resonate with anyone. Now, I feel that I write not just to feel or process but to document and bear witness to tragedies that fascism tries to make us forget.

For my non-Spanish speakers: Ni de aquí ni de allá is an expression that translates roughly to “neither from here nor from there”. It is an expression commonly used in LatinX communities, and expresses a lack of belonging to their family’s culture(s) from their country/countries of origin and to the culture they currently live in.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedThat Place You Don’t Belong

When they took Jesús, marched him out cuffed, he left his wallet on his nightstand, where he kept his gold-embellished navy passport in the vase with the flag people plant in their yards on the 4th.

When they took Jesús, there were no protesters, no jeers, no tears, no red cards. Only the silent flashes of red, white, and blue.

Illegal.
Lawbreaker.
Criminal.
Gang member.
Terrorist.

A citizen on the 12th. An inmate on the 13th.
Ni de aquí, ni de allá.

What they don’t understand, they take to the place you don’t belong.

When they cuffed Jesús, they brought him to a land with walls of bars and a moat of barbs, which they wrapped in ringlets around his temple, placed a bag around his head, stripped him, and beat him as he walked. He walked until he fell. And when he fell, they strung him in the courtyard and on the ground placed a plaque that read:

“Behold! A criminal.”