How many years

has it been since

we heard,

“Kill the Indian, save the soul”?

 

It’s been repeating

like a scratched cd.

Like that CD it skips

to the next song

“The only good Indian is a dead Indain.”

 

These songs ring through time

as they crush the dreams of many.

These songs snatch the hearts

from parents chests.

 

With arms that reach

to the tears of the legacies

that are carried away

By men dressed in Navy Blue

and silver buttons down the chest.

 

No song is heard as an iron thing spews

Columns of smoke and

Takes the heart of the future away with them.

 

Their culture now shunned by rulers

and whips, with strict rules

that cut their pride and erase their love

of Nature.

 

To relapse to what must be remembered

is to be reunited with Mother Earth.