Small Islanders

They left their small island
Searching for better
Looking for homes
Jobs to sustain them
They sailed ‘cross the ocean
Leaving their families
Little to bring
But the clothes they stood up in

On this bigger island
The settled together
Raising their children
In an alien culture
Their devalued language
Was spoken no longer
The streets that they walked
Not paved with gold

Their children grew up
Caught between cultures
Finding no roots
In the past or the present
The gossamer threads of belonging
Elude them
Betrayed by the island
That shut them outside