'A ghetto' is what we say other people
live in, in countries where even when
we know they have difficulty leaving,
and the laws they live under are unfair,
'we don't like to get over concerned'.
We say 'I live in a community' which is
what limits our concern, whilst disguised,
we 'other' our neighbours, by declining
to recognise them as being anything like us.
But there remain similarities to be observed.
The first is who sets the connections
that make a people cohere to each other?
Where a people set their own boundaries
and the fences seem good from both sides
it makes for good neighbours but how long,
in a competitive, materially grasping, world,
will that go on? Even as we like peace at home
we export war and disease abroad for our comfort.
And the greater the comfort
the further away from us
we have to keep war and disease,
whilst importing luxury materials
until where we live is our empire.
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