Modern Definitions for Modern Slavery

Immigration, detention, unequal pay
are modern words for slavery again.

Dictatorship, borders. Any imposition
of one’s will over another

is a form of slavery.
Even the legal rules that enslave:

debt, foreclosure,
poverty above all.

Any compromise of humanity
is a form of bondage.

Then, what can the Arts
do to liberate anybody?

Only this meagerness to witness.
Change the oppression of culture

by conscientiousness. Reintroduce and revalue
cultural shame for exploitation.

Live this illumination
and help another stand

upright, self-determined,
with a soul unbent.