Every Sunday, for the duration of the traveling community art exhibition Reconciliation: What does it mean to you? – from August 13 to December 2, 2017 – to honour the complexity of the task, I will publish a post about my process of decolonization.
Opening of the exhibit:
“RECONCILIATION” – What does it mean to you?
August 13, 2017
why don’t they get over it?
because trust hasn’t been
established / in fact, it has been
betrayed again and again,
and it is still happening each
time that words of truth and
reconciliation are spoken,
but no appropriate
actions are taken, no
money invested, no land
returned / to ask to get over
it is exactly what all abusers
will ask from their victims.
or those who are in denial
of the dynamic of power plays,
of emotional blackmail,
of lying, stealing,
raping and murdering /
why don’t we, settlers,
get over the denial, the
dissociation? / why don’t we
stand still and listen, not
only hear, but listen, when they
are mad, frustrated, in pain,
devastated, pissed off,
shouting / until they
will tell us it’s over?
why?
as my
bare feet move
on the blankets,
as people are displaced,
land stolen,
women & girls killed,
and my baby grabbed
from my arms, kidnapped
for residential school,
the fear
the sadness
the helplessness
are washed away by
THIS…
/ this thing
rising up from
under my feet
moving along my
pelvis
belly button
solar plexus
heart
throat
crown
before showering
my whole being,
restoring my DIGNITY
/ as I became
the witness
of those atrocities,
the witness
of their century long
resistance &
resilience /
the witness of
the now
undeniable living
presence of the
EARTH
of the (res)urgence of
CREATION
Typo or mistake, let me know, I will be very grateful
mari.e cornellier 