So, I'm Told by Sarah Lasoye

'I’m not saying, hey, imagine, what if it was you. / I’m saying it is you' — this poem by Sarah Lasoye collapses the distances between us, where complicity and silence breed and hinder true connection and solidarity. The poem was shortlisted for the 2025 Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize.

So, I’m told that:

             Here, where I am, this is happening
             and There, where they are, that is happening
                                      When, actually:

             Here, where I am, this is happening
             That is happening here, everywhere, always.

Say it with me: 

              Right now, I have lost every member of my family
              and my home is being set on fire. 

             Right now, there is water waist high in my living room 
             and there is someone blowing air into the lungs of my
             neighbour.

Say it with me: 

             There is no sanctuary, no elsewhere, no shoreline in sight. 

             There is a leather boot pressed down on my neck  
             and I can feel the cold floor through my grazed cheek. 

Do you see what I’m saying? 

             If there is somewhere a child can be shot in the head
             then a child is being shot in the head here, everywhere,
             always.   

             The boat you are on has capsized, is capsizing, will capsize. 
             Yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

             You have worked, are working, will work a 3-10am shift  
             without sick pay, pension, or having seen your first born in
             7 years

Do you see what I’m saying? 

             You are not allowed to attend your mother’s funeral 
             You are denied refuge and reprieve  

             I’m not saying, hey, imagine, what if it was you.
             I’m saying it is you.

             You have so little of the people you love. 
             And I am trying to blow air into your lungs.  

  

Cover image: Burnt forest by Akseli Gallen-Kallela