The Dance of Borders: A Tale of Sleepwalkers and Lost Souls

Lo, behold the grand comedy that unfolds at the threshold between two slumbering nations! Here, where artificial lines drawn by the weak divide what nature hath made whole, we witness the desperate waltz of those who seek sanctuary, and those who would deny it.

An American flag hangs on the front porch of a home near the Canada-U.S. border between the U.S. state of New York and the Canadian province of Quebec, near Champlain, New York, U.S., January 17, 2025.
Behold how they plant their flags and draw their lines, these merchants of comfort! They who have never known true struggle, who measure their worth in the height of their fences and the strength of their locks. Yet they tremble at the sight of the desperate souls who dare to cross their sacred boundaries!

In the realm of Perry Mills Road, where Stephen Phaneuf stands guard over his domain, we find a perfect specimen of the modern man's contradiction. He who once embraced the blue banner of democracy now genuflects before the golden tower, seeking salvation in the very walls that imprison his spirit.

Stephen Phaneuf, who lives across the street from the border, poses for a photo near his home along the Canada-U.S. border between the U.S. state of New York and the Canadian province of Quebec, near Champlain, New York, U.S., January 17, 2025.

The tale of the woman and child seeking warmth among swine speaks volumes of our times - a metaphor most profound! In their desperate flight from the electric fence, do we not see the futility of our manufactured boundaries?

O, ye comfortable ones! Ye who sleep soundly in your heated homes while others freeze in pig-pens! How dare you speak of danger from those who risk death to reach your shores? Your comfort has become your prison, your safety your chain!

The bureaucrats in their wisdom have crafted new agreements, shuffling papers while souls wander in the wilderness. They celebrate the closure of Roxham Road as if sealing one crack in the dam might hold back the ocean's tide. Such is the way of the modern world - treating symptoms while the disease festers beneath.

A woman and her two children board a Greyhound bus to New York City after attempting to claim asylum in Canada and being turned away, in Plattsburgh, New York, U.S., January 17, 2025.

Witness the spectacle at the Sunoco station - a mother and her pink-jacketed offspring, turned away by those who worship at the altar of order and regulation. They weep, these rejected ones, while the sleepers fuel their vehicles and continue their mindless journeys, blind to the tragedy before them.

See how they count their numbers and celebrate their statistics! These merchants of fear who measure human suffering in percentages and patrol patterns! They speak of protection while building walls around their own hearts!
U.S. Border patrol officers speak with an RCMP Officer.

And lo, the guardians of order meet at their artificial line, exchanging pleasantries while the desperate seek new paths through the wilderness. They speak of cooperation while competing to prove who can be more vigilant, more ruthless in their enforcement of imaginary boundaries.

The true tragedy lies not in the crossing of borders, but in the crossing of souls - those who once welcomed the stranger now bar their doors, those who once sought justice now seek only peace at any price. The land of the sleepers grows ever more crowded, as comfort and fear become the twin pillars of their existence.

Harken, ye who still have ears to hear! The time approaches when the walls ye build shall crumble, when the boundaries ye draw shall fade like morning mist. For the spirit of man knows no borders, and those who would cage it only cage themselves!

Thus do we witness the eternal dance of the powerful and the powerless, the comfortable and the desperate, played out upon the stage of our artificial boundaries. And in this dance, who shall lead and who shall follow? Who shall wake and who shall continue in their slumber?