Ancestral River

Flying through the warm dry air
I see the river below me
The river knows all of our stories
She flows, twists, and crosses
the reified borders we call our homes
occupied regions
too many times over
cut out of our lands
one
arbitrary
or strategic piece
at a time…


This river does not touch all of our borders
but she does hear the stories of all those who flee across, around, and beyond her
from all directions
witnessing the injustice
and supporting our resistance to it


As I fly
the wind and sun sweep against my face
I squint while looking down
I can see them
All of them
small, greedy, foreign powers
colonially trained elites
and dashing diasporics
with wide grins
I can almost see their teeth
I can hear them too
laughing about their latest conquest
sanctioned by the UN’s Turn the Other Cheek Act


The participants? the upper crusts
of browns, reds, yellows, and blacks,
least we forget whites
All of them co-optively appointed incorporations of racist imperialist capitalism
Patenting and commodifying life
Damming and diverting our rivers
Raping and polluting our oceans
Ravaging the daily lives of billions with their multiple inhabitations of greed
Attempting to white-out our histories, memories, and peoples


All the while
forgetting the inevitability of connection
our ancestral rivers seas oceans brooks lakes and streams
witnessing
merging
teaching us
to come together…
regardless

This artwork and poem are excerpts from: Uninhabiting the Violence of Silencing:activations of creativity, ethics and resistance