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Prose Nocturnes: Wretched Refuse
". . . wretched refuse of your teeming shore."
---Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus"
Waving their crosses and staves, loosing the vicious dogs upon us, they have harried us from city, village, and countryside, crying "Destroy them, destroy them," barring us from their thresholds, leaving no safe haven for us, no shelter. So we have come to America, hidden and huddling in the hold of stinking steamer, illicit passage for illicit persons, no questions asked. America is the land of opportunity, but we scarce could believe how much. The whole country is torn by a civil war, and bloody battles have been fought, and will continue to be fought. Coming to Gettysburg on the fifth of July, the day after some important day to them, we find multitudes of wounded and dying men, all of them bleeding, all of them available to quench our thirst. We walk among them, ostensible volunteers to help in the hours of darkness, wishing only to lend a compassionate hand. By all the infernal gods, how we quench our thirst. We quench and quench, and third for even more, and still we quench. This land of opportunity: why did we wait so long and suffer so much?
