When I pile up cut tomatoes, red onion, and radishes
on top of romaine lettuce, I think of the hands that
picked, cleaned, packed, and loaded them on trucks,
carried them to cold rooms arranged them on the shelves.
As I remember stories of my father, a newcomer
a child-laborer in another era in another country,
 
I say a prayer for you
 
With every piece of bread in my hand,
every corn kernel on my plate, in my bowl
while savoring a few strawberries in the morning
I see you on screen of my mind, picking them with
hands covered with calluses your feet buried in mud
your back pained from bending all day from dawn
to dusk, all for a few dollar an hour. I put down
the bread, the meal, and the berries
 
I say a prayer for you
 
I watch the evening news, see you who have crossed
the border without permit in pursuit of  a dream,
now with shackles on your wrists, fear in your eyes,
pain of separation from your loved ones on your face.
I watch the border patrols chasing you from ditch to ditch
in hot dry days and at dark scary nights till you fall
face down on the ground, guns pointing at your head
 
I say a prayer for you.