Stranger in a Cage

They do not need much,
a word, a wrinkle, an accent,
a place of birth,
or a colour,
or any one of countless
tiny things.
That is all they need, 
to build the cage,
in which a stranger now waits:
teacher, father, mother,
dreamer of mountains and oceans,
a voice to challenge the silence.

They, who did not need much,
admire their cage,
peer quizzically 
through the bars,
congratulate themselves,
on their sageness,
nod knowingly
at the stranger in their prison
and say-
you are this, you are only this.

The stranger,
whose name is misspelled,
in the mouths of his captors
listens with muffled heart
and contemplates,
a fate decided by those
who make sport,
in the mistaking
of shadows for faces,
and replacing the lives
of others with labels - 
labels that are nothing,
but a padlock,
on the door 
to identity.