In North Philly, we were ambushed by a rogue visitor;
one that clutched our throats and threatened to choke us
out of our budding Americana.
That March, someone reported us to immigration.
And after an investigation,
we were sent a decision.
Arriving in a letter, neat and succinct, was our invitation to travel.
The Mayson family is ordered to depart from the United States of America
at your own expense on or before April 2, 1979.
And we were guilty of the worst crime.
We had no papers.
Dirty immigrants.
Huddled masses.
Illegal aliens.
Pretending to be Americans,
hiding in plain sight among the good people of Philadelphia.
Frenzied lot of Liberians we were,
not even living high off the fat of the land.
We didn’t even sip their milk or their honey.
A shrinking life we had.
So hushed in fact,
that night I strained to hear my father cry—
my mother’s whimpers, barely audible.
And even I learned to tuck this voice
under my tongue
and didn’t release it for years.