Today I share a song I've been working on since my time spent in Arizona, it feels far from finished, but it also feels important to share, to say, I'm working on this, I'm processing and praying.....and singing. I remain continually bothered by the stories and images of undocumented border crosser deaths. In Pima County where we spent our week back in October, there is on average around 175 bodies found in the desert per year. And that's just the bones and remains that are found....how many more are up on the mountain ridges or buried and scattered by animals and weather? How many families are left wondering where their sons and daughters and fathers and sisters are?
I have so many questions....what leads a person to view their only viable option as a dangerous journey across the sand in the heat of an Arizona summer? What can we do? How do we learn to live with the ache that this happens, that people die. alone.
So here goes nothing. On today, which the UN recognizes as International Migrant Day, I offer up this fledgling new song.....Desert Bones
Also, the "map of the desert" is an online interactive map through Humane Borders.... You can find it here.