From the purses of immigrants roll out candies
like not-blessed eye balls, right in front of our feet.
And just about to say Well Come, we
rather remain silent
as if ripping off the tree roots from its soil
or sending the raindrops back where they came from
locking up our dear immigrants, outside
till we lock ourselves into cells,
shrinking more and more.
Dear Immigrants
[audio:https://cordite.org.au/audio/sevgili-gocmenler-dear-immigrants.mp3|titles=Dear Immigrants]
Elif Sezen, born in Melbourne in 1981, grew up both here and in Izmir, Turkey. She settled in Melbourne in 2007. Also an interdisciplinary visual artist, she writes original poetry in English and in Turkish. In 2014 she published a Turkish translation of Ilya Kaminsky’s acclaimed book
Dancing in Odessa; her own first work in Turkish, an experimental mix of poetry and prose
Gece Düşüşü (‘Fall.Night.’) was published in 2012. Her collection of poems
Universal Mother was recently published by GloriaSMH Press. She holds a PhD in Fine Arts from Monash University.
