As I walk

As I walk, a pebble in my shoe, causes discomfort
I stoop to remove it.
The ground beneath my feet trembles with anguished groans,
labouring,
she releases the spirit of these 215 children
who cry out for justice,
for truth
Demanding to be
Recognized,
Remembered
Honoured.
Their pain, their truth needs to be
Told,
Heard,
Witnessed

A truth that I as a white settler
have been complicit in keeping
unnamed
unmarked.
A truth that for too long
I and my ancestors have claimed
to not know.

My mind urges me
to not look
to not enter
to not know
it perceives
a discomfort
in this place

Anthropocene unburials
releasing
preserved
what was hoped would be forgotten,
buried,
unmarked,
is demanding to be seen
to come into the light

a kind of resurfacing
eerie,
unsettled
disclosing old histories
my sense of time is altered, tangled
this notion of deep time
sets out my unrest
not in a soothing context
but in in a more reality-based sharpening context
beckoning a future
look at the gift of being, now
look at the astonishing responsibility.
Will I be a good ancestor?
Will I take responsibility for people I have not only not met but will never meet?
These children are asking me to attend to who I am, what I do and reconcile now,
precisely for a world I’ll never see.

I will be an ancestor, the choice I have is what type of ancestor will I be
I will be a part of 7 generations
The choice is which series of concentric circles
will I choose to inhabit?
one that seeks truth and reconciliation or
one that continues to suppress, deny and cause harm
I pledge to walk the path of reconciliation;

I rise up
the pebble still in my shoe,
serves as a constant reminder
of the truth
to walk in the discomfort
to step forward and
to join the journey of reconciliation