PROTEST SONG
Do I have to
comfort you,
little ones?
The cancer
has spread
deep into
the country,
even beyond
the outlying
provinces.
The Christian
god won’t bring
back coal.
And don’t you
think the air
is too full of it
already? You
can’t fight
the lower
wages across
the border,
and besides
this will mean
others will
have more
reasons to stay
on their own
side where we
know they
have always
belonged. Fear
not. This
is how we make
America great
again as, one
by one, million
dollar mansions
crumble into
an unforgiving
sea, not one
then, but two
Americas
as the borders
that have
been drawn
start to redraw
themselves
again, can’t
you smell
the fear inside
their blood
just before
it’s shed?
The pipeline
will not
go through,
not if
any of us
can help it.
Goddamn
the buffalo
gathered on
the horizon
if they aren’t
ready to
stampede
for they know
which side
we’re taking,
water cannon
fire be
damned,
concussion
grenades
be damned—
lobbed across
lands we hold
most sacred.
A man without
a soul-friend
is like a lake
no good
for bathing
nor drinking
so fear not,
little ones,
the ancestors
won’t leave us
the same way
shit jobs
have already
left them
holding on
to nothing
more than
a tiny
scorched
tract of earth
called home.
—Poets Respond
December 1, 2016
__________
Timothy Liu: “The protestors at Standing Rock have been given a deadline of December 5th to abandon their obstructing location. A friend of mine recently returned from the site, saying, ‘They pray 24/7 there, they never stop praying! Who are they praying too?’ My friend has doubts over the existence of a higher power but did his part anyway. I wrote this poem out of solidarity.” (website)
