On the first Monday of July
Gone are the sadistic months of prison,
Comes in a month of rejoice and freedom 
Banished is Juno from newly anointed King Julius Caesar’s kingdom
And the realm of Great Julius begins

All was looking good
Until you told me
How you had to pass Lady Liberty tomorrow
Not as a tourist, or onlooker
But as an illegal immigrant
No warning, no hint
Just how you had to leave

How could you be so devoid of emotion
To leave me, on the day of our rejoice?
Yet, I understood, when you told me why.

How the despicable Big Brother
Enforced the law effective on July 1
So that all immigrants be kicked out of America
Before the 4th to commemorate
“A new authentic America!”
As if.

As if kicking out Asians, Indians, African “Americans”
Would make America authentic
I thought America was about diversity
Yet, the Big Brother
Denied any diversity
Claiming that the best diversity is American diversity
As if.

Of course, America is about “freedom of speech!”
And the “pursuit of happiness”
Which brought you here, my dear friend
Rubbing Lady Liberty’s feet on the way
Smelling the old, coppery smell
Perceiving it as the first smell of happiness

We conferred in the twilight of the Magnolia trees
How great it was to be reunited
How the moon and the stars
Were despicable ancestral beings
For limiting our time together

We were simply
Two lovers from across the globe
The hammer and the sickle
Granted access by the donkey
To be banished four years later by the elephant

After the torturous hours of repetitive good-byes
For we could not seem to say enough
Fondly, I look back at our old habit
Of saying good-bye last because we loved each other too much
To not answer back one’s good-bye.

You had to leave
I snatched wildly for you
Against the cold, metallic iron railings
That tourists milled around
But I cried around

I saw you rub the Lady’s feet once more
Not in joy, but in a wave of grief
And then you, my love, vanished with the sunset
With the ancestral beings you so despised

How funny I believed communism was unreal thing
Till it’s on my front doorstep
Bloodstained, from the protests of the immigrants

---------

20 years and 3 days now,
I write to you

You have left well, my love
The revelations are becoming true
The dark horse rider has come
Lady Liberty now stands stained
Mount Rushmore has become one face
The White House is red.
Our symbol is the hammer and sickle
Today is the Fourth of July.
Independence Day.

Meant to commemorate our independence from Great England
Meant to be a day of honor
Pride and indulgence in our accomplishment

The hell it be with our triumph
The hell with real estate
Be gone! Oh hammer and sickle

Dear love,
Let this day be a day of our separation
For I have never felt so far from you
For I still gaze under the magnolia trees.

I still cry for you.
I still miss you.

And it still devours me that,
You had to hear the last goodbye

And I didn’t.