Forgetfullness

It is fall and the wind is blowing. Who are you and where are you
going, what will your future hold and what are you doing for your
people? How is it that you come here and just take life for granted
when the rights of our people are being taken away, the places of your
birth are being taken, oil and gas companies are drilling holes into
the earth, the water is being used for transporting coal, huge
powerlines cross your land and your homes sit with kerosene lamps. How
long will this go on?

Whar are you doing about it? Tell me what constructive things you are
doing to ensure that you and your family, the way of life of your
people are going to be here tomorrow. What is important to you?


Are you going to be sitting pretty with a high paying job and then
talk about all the people back home that just sit around and play
basketball and collect general assistance? How you struggled to get
where you are and that you did it by yourself? Ah, yes that money in
the bank, that credit card and fancy car make you the person you are,
but that isn't so.


The one thing that comes to mind, is that we are a part of the land,
the earth, the sky, the places of home where you walked, where your
mother gave you birth, if not there you have to know that her
mother's mother gave life so that you might live. That they suffered
hunger, cold, hostility, and near annihilation to get you where you
are today. What it so easy?


Who are you? What are you? I am nothing but what I have made of
myself, I did it all and no one helped me, if you believe that then
you are just like one of those people who look at Indian with
curiosity, you have become too civilized. Who are you to pass
judgement on those people at home who are still struggling to provide
food, heat and shelter? Who wonder how to put gas in aaaan empty gas
tank and get by until they can get some cash or something to pawn.
Who live with cold water because there is no hot water. Who look for
a pencil with an eraser for their children to go to school because
they can't afford one.


Where are we going to? I am tired of the struggle to get something,
to have the house with a garage, a new car, satellite t.v, but moreso
I hate to hear how we struggle dto get somewhere and did it by
ourselves, no one helped us. So is our struggle over and we forget
about those who go without the basic things of life.


Look at your shoes, how do they look? Let me tell you there are
children who have shoes that don't fit, old people who go to the junk
yard, and thrift stores trying to get by on old shoes. Our people are
sitting at home counting pennies, trying to buy a $1.49 bag of
potatoes and we talk about new cell phones, or your last trip to some
place far away.


Who am I to say these things, I am no one, I am the worst, like you I
want the dream, but it is not the right dream, it shines so in the
sun light, it glistens. It purrs and with it I find that when I get
into it, it gives nothing in return.


Where are the hungry children? the old, those who can't walk and
suffer with sickness. They are all around. Where have I been, but
just to offer a kind word and then to leave and forget about them,
their faces, the way the place looks. It is easy to say it is their
fault, but then who am I too say.


I dreamed of better days. when the sun shined on all our faces and we
were free, but it is not so anymore. We are bound to our new ways,
and forgetfullness welcomes me as I go about and leave those that
stayed behind.


In the silence of the night, in the stirring of leaves and falling of
the snow their needs grow silent. Who are these people, some I don't
know but some are family, relations that struggle in silence, in
poverty, and sickness.


I am barren, I have nothing and yet everything for I have not taken
even the basic things to them. I have not hauled water, nor wood, not
any food, not even shared my coat or a meal with them. But moreso I
have forgotten about them and their voices are silent yet they cry,
who will remember me, what am I to do, how am I to get by.


This is what comes to me as I sit here, and in seeing them silently,
as whispers on the wind I hear their stifled cry and I weep for them
and myself because I have forgotten the sound of their voices, the
warmth of a meal shared and to know that they once called me brother.
I weep for them and for myself, bacause all the ask for is a little
and nothing has come to them from one of their own. Where did they
go, what happened to them, they are gone but yet they continue, they
struggle and we survive. Forgetfullness is my friend and it comes
when I talk about how I struggled to get where I am. It is far from
where I came from and yet, I have gone nowhere.


--
rustywire