We asked the Brooklyn poet, Walter Whitman, for his thoughts about the “crisis at the border,” and he sent us this:
Unscrew the locks from the doors!
Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs!
Though somewhat obscure, Mr. Whitman’s view of the situation seems to align with that of Emma Lazarus:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!