Who Is That Refugee?
Words and Music Pat Drummond
For Abdul Khaliq Samadi, Topside Camp, Nauru
and Daniel Emmad, Villawood Detention Centre 2002

Matthew, 1 - 28
The angel came to Joseph late
one night
And said, "You must be gone
Gather up your wife and infant son
for you must leave this place
Herod seeks you, death awaits
Through Israel's dark and bloodstained gates
to Egypt you must flee!"
Jesus was a child when he became a refugee

Chorus: At the mercy of the stranger
Seeking shelter from 'The Fates'
From certain death and danger
To where uncertainty awaits
Speak to me my country
Tell me what you see
Underneath the razor wire
In those same dark frightened eyes
Tell me if you recognize
Who is that refugee?

The Bible tells us Herod slew
each child below the age of two
years old
to save his dynasty
Political expediency
really isn't something new
Politicians always do
what their ambitions tell them to
and truth is sacrificed
but shame is all a nation buys
when children pay the price

Chorus:

They did not speak the language
but they prayed God would provide
through the kindness of the stranger
and there they stayed
till the day
that Herod died
And if they'd sold all they that owned
to pay for their escape...
look at your children,
and if you love them
tell me then which of you would even hesitate?

Hundreds of children, heaven sent
have been living in imprisonment
for years;
for the crime of being poor
fleeing famine, poverty and war
I hear you say to me
"They're not our responsibility
They came unasked across the sea"
Yes... and so did we.
And if we lived back in Egypt when
that family fled from Herod's men
would we have imprisoned them
among the refugees?

Chorus

"What you do to these, the least of them
you surely do to me."
Underneath the razor wire
In those same dark frightened eyes
Tell me if you recognize
Who is that refugee?

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