Dave Bonta's "Refugees" is a short, hard poem about people who flee to another country and find only more harm there. The opening image puts the sun and "Caesar" side by side, as if blistering heat and political power were the same kind of force, both striking down on people who have nothing to protect them. Caesar suggests an empire, an authority that rules and punishes.
The second stanza turns to crucifixion. The refugees "call on a cross twice as heavy as they are," which I read as praying or crying out under a burden bigger than they can carry. The imagery suggests suffering that is both religious and unbearably physical.
The last lines are the bleakest. Children grow "monstrous in the dust," twisted by the conditions around them rather than by anything in themselves. The speaker doesn't lecture, but the mood is grim, angry, and sorrowful. The plain, clipped language makes the cruelty feel matter-of-fact, which is part of what makes it so unsettling.