POEM AND LETTER FROM MANUS ISLAND

Letter and poem from Manus Island Detention Camp with request that it be included in Palm Sunday Rallies this Weekend - 11/04/2014

I am writing from Manus Island Detention Camp.

We left our homes because of a variety of reasons. We found Australia thinking this would be a place of shelter. We had different reasons for stepping into this very dangerous and so suffering journey. But all of us suffered from a common pain, which was lack of freedom.

We didn't come to Australia to take from you.
Australia didn't confirm us and banished us to a so far island in the middle of the ocean. After about 9 months traveling on land, by car, plane, boat, and ship we have been banished and faced being wildly attacked. This led to the killing of one man, Reza Barati, and the injuring of more than 150 asylum seekers. Some of them even lost parts of their bodies.

We have borne many kinds of disrespect. We are in a very bad mentally sick and physical health situation now. The fungus illness is epidemic here in camp and many of us are suffering from that. We are stuck in limbo in here. This experience is unexplainable through words. We can not go back and we cannot go on. Now, after about 9 months, everything in us has become dull and everything is meaningless.

Now we watch the broken pieces of our heart and souls on the ground. We don't know if these broken pieces are all we will ever see. We don't know whether these terrible days and nights will come to the end or not?

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