Migration to this continent, ten thousand years ago,
Or twenty, even thirty: humans ever on the go,
First walked across the Bering Strait, a frozen wasteland then, (1)
The families of humankind, their children, women, men.

We first evolved in Africa, skins darkened by the sun.
Then walked up through the Middle East, skins looking less well-done.
And some turned left to Europe, while some other groups turned right.
Far north of the Equator’s sun, our skins turned almost white.

To synthesize the vitamin that we know as D3,
Sunlight is necessary, biochemists all agree.
Up north, the sunlight’s less intense; mutations in the skin
Will benefit the mutants who can’t make much melanin. (2)

America was populated from fair Asian folk,
From west to east and then down south in groups, first close kinfolk.
As more and more groups came across, new languages appeared,
As spoken by some different tribes, now “others,” to be feared.

Then, over the millenia, societies arose,
With hunters, farmers, then big cities, other people, foes,
Religions, lots of rituals and lots of deities,
And even human sacrifice, an old, pale-skin disease. (3)

But here, there was no Iron Age, most weapons stayed of stone.
With Variola absent too, Smallpox remained unknown.
And then, a thousand years ago, a Norseman sailed the sea
And landed north, in Canada, but left no legacy. (4)

Again, five hundred years ago, a sailor heading west,
Ran into North America, an uninvited guest. (5)
The Europeans had arrived; new migrants filled the land,
First, just a trickle, then a wave, their goal, to seize command.

The European migrants brought their guns and germs and steel. (6)
Explored for gold and silver, land to occupy and steal.
Their guns and steel were weapons, their diseases even more.
Their Destiny was Manifest in their religious lore. (7)

And, after a few centuries, the European whites
Assumed the continent was theirs; their God conveyed their rights.
Their Bible and their God assured them this new land was theirs;
It was theirs for the taking, the reward to him who dares.

Today, among the immigrants, the latest to arrive,
Assert that they’re the rightful heirs, and therefore may deprive
The tired, the poor, the huddled masses, yearning to breathe free, (8)
Of any right to migrate; taking charge of history.

Should this nation just be Christian, white, (as it’s never been?) (9)
Or land for all religions, every human shade of skin? (10)
A land that’s welcomed migrants, starting in the last Ice Age,
And does not need a new ICE Age? It’s time to turn the page.

(1) The last “glacial period” was from about 26,000 to about 20,000 years ago.
Sea level was as much as 400 feet lower, making a Bering land bridge.
(2) Disabling mutations in melanin synthesis pathways, that produce dark skins
in peri-equatorial peoples, have occurred in both human populations that
migrated to Europe and migrated to Asia. (3) See Genesis, 22, “The Binding of Isaac.”
(4) Leif Erikson is generally thought to have discovered “Vinland,” about 1,000
CE, in northern Newfoundland, in which remains of a Viking settlement
were discovered in 1960. The settlement ultimately failed and was
abandoned.
(5) Christopher Columbus, an Italian sailing for Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain,
landed in the Bahamas, on the island that is now called San Salvador, on
October 12, 1492. He also visited the island that now has the nations of the
Dominican Republic and Haiti.
(6) See, “Guns, Germs, and Steel, the Fates of Human Societies, 1997, by Jared
Diamond.
(7) Look up the doctrine of Manifest Destiny, which told European migrants
that they had a divine right to take America from ocean to ocean. Native
people were outgunned and nearly wiped out by diseases such as Smallpox.
(8) See “The New Colossus,”1883, by Emma Lazarus, the Petrarchan sonnet at
the base of the Statue of Liberty.
(9) See Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli, 1797, a statement by John Adams.
(10) “What is America to me? A name, a map, a flag I see?”…”All races, all
religions, that’s America to me.” These are words from “The House I Live
In,” as sung by Paul Robeson and later by Frank Sinatra. It is well worth a
listen.