prime humans - poem

This poem deals with human trafficking and the comment made by an ICE acting director. I beseech you, if you are not in a good headspace skip reading this.

A photograph of a tap on the dirty white wall of a stable, ground covered in hay. Sourced from Pexels. Taken by khezez | خزاز and uploaded October 15th, 2022.

A Note: The topic of this poem is grim and disgusting. It directly relates to comments recently made by those working within the ICE system. I beseech you, if you are not in a good headspace, if you are not in a place in life where you can intake and acknowledge such things, then please, skip reading this.

You will not be able to help anyone if you are caught in despair.

And despair is where they want us.

Find your mutual aid groups. Find any training workshops in your area that you have the energy for and that would be beneficial.

A potential place to start would be looking at Distribute Aid: distributeaid.org

And remember, whatever thread you can pull on to unravel their plan, no matter how small you perceive it to be. It HELPS. So pull.

Poem under the picture.

A black and white photo of a neon sign on a brick wall. The sign reads Fight For Your Right. Picture sourced from Pexels, uploaded by cottonbro studio on June 29th, 2020.

Like Prime, but with human beings.

a website

invite only, based on net value

a one time code sent to log in

every single time

assuming they even care about not leaving traces

a billionaire

bored at playing their job

bored at playing human

they log on

perhaps they scroll

perhaps they know exactly what they want

tap

SALE COMPLETE

DELIVERY EXPECTED IN 1 HOUR

enough time

to yell at the

underpaid

underfed staff

who really should be grateful to be employed

to get the stables ready

new livestock will be arriving

a story as old as humanity

growing, somehow, worse

with each iteration

never truly ending

only forced out of public perception

humans

those deemed secondary

□ not white

□ not straight

□ not cis

□ not men

□ not rich

□ not Christian

□ not grown

□ not of the right lineage

□ not obedient

□

truly there will be no line

no dignity

no care

chipped and labeled

on a planet poisoned and distraught

time

circling

when will it ever not turn to rust

genetic traumas front and center

ancestors aghast

the most efficient trafficking scheme

acknowledged

endorsed

open and blatant

A screen shot of a passage from the Washington Post article that inspired this poem. The passage reads: "We need to get better at treating this like a business," ICE acting director Todd M. Lyons said at a border security conference in April, according to the Arizona Mirror. The administration's goal, he said, was to deport immigrants as efficiently as Amazon moves packages: "Like Prime, but with human beings."

from a December 24th, 2025 article from the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/12/24/ice-immigrants-detention-warehouses-deportation-trump/