A Lost Immigrant's Prayer.

Across rivers and oceans,

Through clouds and skies,

We journeyed from the old world to the new,

The mystery before us, beckoned like a seductive sorceress.

And yet, even not knowing, we dared to embrace it still

We fled a land of hunger and despair and pain

We loosed the cobwebs of chains that held us in bondage

And wept with hope at the freedom of a new age

And slept with the painful memory

of how we were called efulefu.

And so we came, freeborn all

To begin as neither masters nor slaves.

Rather we start again as nothing.

We live day to day on graces,

Showered from the lands of our birth

We refuse to give up

We shall make a home here yet

A home for the little ones, yet unborn

We shall work the fields

And stand in line like robots

Yes, we shall be called only by numbers,

Remaining faceless and nameless.

We shall do these things

So that one day

Our children shall proudly bear our names

And none shall ever be called efulefu.

We shall teach them well, our children,

Of the old ways from where we fled

For we see now, the beauty

Clearly hidden in the grotesque shadows of the old world.

We fled diseases and now are plagued with diseased minds.

We fled poverty and now see the sins in plenty

Nothing is sacred, even old age is defiled

We see the lights everywhere

And the darkness that lurks a breath behind

We shall teach them well, our children

To marry the old worlds of soul with the new one of steel

And create something uniquely theirs

For only with this artistry can they conquer

And be kings of these new dynamic worlds emerging.

Remembering always the land from where we came

So that none shall ever be called efulefu.