Movement 515 is an art-filled community where students around the Metro meet twice a week to create poetry, music, graffiti, or dance. These students work to speak their truth and create the change needed in their communities. This group changes students’ lives by providing platforms where they are able to express themselves in any way. The Hoover Movement 515 team meets on Tuesdays in Ms.Hollins’ room (Room 1115) from 3:40 p.m. to 5:15 p.m. and on Wednesdays from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. at Central Campus.

The poem below is written by sophomore Caliyah Saxton and was inspired by the treatment of immigrants and the role that America plays in the difficulties that they face. She is aiming to educate and allow us to acknowledge how much immigrants go through at the hands of America.

“The audience I am trying to reach is those who don’t know, or don’t include themselves in the narrative of immigration. Because everyone plays a part in it, our mindsets/attitude towards immigrants, the cheap food and labor we enjoy, our votes on candidates, etc,” Saxton said.

Borders used to keep people out, or shut them in

There’s no going back when your life is what’s being attacked

Your well-being what you’re shielding, sanctuary you’re seeking

Used, abused, raped, your foreign tongue doesn’t know the language

First thing you learned is that you can’t say no

Your culture doesn’t fit so you strip and chip away at it

Now there’s nothing left but the bare bones and unmarked graves

The word illegal shaves away the bravery of your journey

Yearning for papers to prove your move was ok, that you’ll be ok

Hoping and praying that your children will be safe even if you’re taken away

You’ve paid the toll to the man to get you over the wall, wall they want to make tall, tall fields you rake.

They snake around you, try to shake you up.

They break you up and load the trucks

Back home you go where everything is marked USA, guns, ammo, and granite made graves

Cargo filled to the brim with boxes to keep Americans in their white line haze

Your country has now become a store

More and more orders

The more orders, the more they talk about borders

“Build the wall!”

Enclose ourselves and see the mess we’ve made

Detox spread like chicken pox, but they won’t stop

Please stop and look at the destruction settled in your footsteps

A seed that has sprouted so deep, to cut it would bring us to our knees

To work in our own fields

To fill all the jobs that only pay minimum-wage

To claw at the walls we built around ourselves

To climb the wall we built around our country