To be seen: these eyes, the mouth, the strain, this face

smashed by thoughtless time.

A laughing Child

his Mother’s sorrow

an Aunt’s lament.

What is this?

Black rock hard

surfacing through craggy attentions,

a warrior in anguish. Blown to ash.

What is this?

Earth’s swelling loss.

Split shards

scattered between here and

almost,

each fragment

a hint.

An ignoble death, they said, watching

and waiting for the chosen ones to arrive.

And She with glory crowning stares

straight, follows a path lit

by the fallen ones, each step

a new landing.

Meeting ground between sole

and soil.

A crossroads

daring to be noticed,

hidden by choice.

elle she la hembra…

Tiny whispers of lives forgotten

wash past—not under—

the few that survive.

Were it not for seeing the shimmer of you in the distance,

I would barely know who this was/is.

The year is 2016.

I have been struggling to articulate an appropriate response to the unrelenting violence in thought, word, and deed directed towards us as African descended peoples. I am haunted by a 4-year-old’s clarity: evaporated innocence. Her sweet voice, surreal amidst the terror, reminding her mother that she's there and that everything's going to be ok. In one simple instinctual gesture. Echoing a grandmother’s love for a disquieted child. And I too want to believe that it's all going to be ok.

The year is 2020.

I am bolstered by the strong voice of protest reverberating through grassroots movements—Black Lives Matter, Wet’suwet’en Strong—and I feel the need to stand up and scream NO MORE. As I move along with the Montreal crowd in protest—maintaining what we now call social distance—there are moments when I am compelled to stop my voice, to hear the chants—black lives matter, no justice, no peace—which are, to my ear, transformed into meaningless sound bites.

The year is 2021.

In this necessary pause from all that we in North America know as freedom, I recognize a deeper wound that cannot be addressed through protest alone. I observe the gestures of protest, fists raised high, and I can’t help but notice exposed side ribs, hearts and guts. I listen to hear the strained voice of public grief stopped short by the horror of incompetent justice. I vibrate alongside the strained voice of protest pushing to express (in the limited time given) a manifesto justifying our right to survive.

There is no bypassing loss...

What is this?

Now reshaped to a Sister’s song.

His passage or hers?

A cleansing.

Notes

This work was first produced by Primary Colours/couleurs primaires in June 2021 as part of the BLM=BAM initiative which commemorated the first anniversary of the murder of George Floyd. A recording is available at primary-colours.ca/projects/151- a-sister-s-song