'Remember the ship'

John Agard

As citizen
of the English tongue

I say remember
the ship
in citizenship

for language
is the baggage
we bring -

a weight
of words to ground
and give us wing -

as millennial waters
beckon wide

and love's anchor
waiting to be cast

will the ghost of race
become the albatross
we shoot at our cost?

I'm here to navigate -
not flagellate
with a whip of the past

for is not each member
of the human race
a ship on two legs

charting life's tidal
rise and fall

as the ship
of the sun
unloads its light

and the ship
of night
its cargo of stars

again I say remember
the ship
in citizenship

and diversity
shall sound its trumpet
outside the bigot's wall

and citizenship shall be
a call
to kinship

that knows
no boundary
of skin

and the heart
offer its wide harbours
for Europe's new voyage

to begin