Sacrificial or Superficial?

A year ago, on this very day, I came to a place far from home, with a few documents in hand and cents resting quietly in my pocket. I walked inland, thinking choice was mine, movement still meant direction. Life wasn’t perfect, but it felt negotiable. The city unfolded as I moved through it— Skyscrapers rose, crowds swept past, echoes of hard work lingering in their wake. A city vast, almost blinding. I wondered how I had earned my place here. I kept walking until I reached a home that was not mine, left my bags, settled into borrowed hours. At dawn, I looked outside— light folding back on glass. In that moment, I mistook reflection for arrival. A year passed. The dream thinned quietly. I was evicted without ceremony. The landlord spoke plainly: “We don’t accept aliens anymore.” I wondered why the word arrived after my labour did. Everything I earned dissolved— claimed as the state’s share, the law precise, the loss unnamed. Outside the place I once entered freely, I checked my pocket. The same cents remained from the day I arrived. I walked on, each step murmuring what I no longer argued. Around me, voices rose— chants certain of their place. My voice stayed with my breath; exhaustion had already chosen