I am not a migrant or a refugee

I am not a migrant or a refugee

Sometimes that still shocks me

The me that is not quite white

The me that listens as people trip

over the soft round vowels of my name

The me that refuses to cover

the tattoos that show me as other

and knows that neither my father nor mother

are Australian

I am not a migrant or a refugee

Though my people are of the sea

So that when someone is a true leader

We call them
Tautai

Navigator

One who has warred with waves.

It is a title of respect, of honour

But here, here, I hear

Stop the boats

And wonder where the honour is 

in people playing politics with people's lives

As Machiavelli thrives, and they sharpen knives, and we don't stop as they dehumanise

And 'welcome to Australia'
gets drowned

Like those children THEY like to throw overboard.

WE
 are so much better than
THEM

We'd only put those children in detention

And call that civilised.

We call it humanity and generosity
as we send them off to Nauru and PNG

And we say
oh well

I am not a migrant or refugee

I am not a migrant or a refugee

I'm an Australian by accident of birth I say blithely

To explain that I was born when my dad was doing his PhD

And we left when I was three

to a place where the Southern Cross meant something other

then a badge for bogans

who tell you to get the fuck out of the country

that Captain Cook claimed to have discovered

when it had long since
been found. 

No, I am not a migrant or a refugee

But if this is the quality of our discourse

Then God, oh my God

Allah huma Allah

We really need the diversity.