Lost Sisters

To those who are gone,

Cruel though it may be, I cannot but wish that you are dead. A blessing, I would call it, to not suffer the horrors that do the living like you. When we burn our medicines for you, the tobacco smoke I send to the Spirits carries my wish that you are safe from the suffering of so many of your sisters. Whose pained cries and hopeless screams are unheard and un-mourned, except by those who knew you before you vanished from the world.

We, those of us who are apart from you and your lands and your waters, do not know your names. We only know that you were taken into the grey fog, and that we shall never hear your songs until our own steps carry us off the Medicine Wheel into the unknown.

But you are, none of you, forgotten. Your loss, each and every one, is a wound we carry in our souls. Your steps in the dances and your voices in the songs are missed by those of us who remain. Though the rhythm of our strikers on the drums is steady, your heartbeats are missed as we measure out the life thrum of our nation. The absence of your steps at sunrise and at solstice is felt by each of us who tend the fire of our resilience.

You are with us, even after you’ve walked on.

In the stories you inspired us to tell, your memory is carried with us. The voices you can no longer use are heard through the tales we tell of you and of hope. Your story, even its heartbreaking end, is the fuel that feeds us. That tells us the fight is not yet done. That our sisters are still lost. Never to be found.

In the steps we take to right the colonial wrongs, your spirits walk beside us. They strengthen our arms with your memories. With the words and deeds of love that you filled the world, you are remembered in our struggle for brighter days.

In our voices as we cry, as we rage against the world set against us, your voice is heard also. Showing itself in our grief, it returns to the world of pain and sorrow that I hope you no longer feel. We scream your names, though we know not them all. We weep for you, who have left the Wheel before your time, taken by those who did not deserve to stand upon the land with you.

Your strength is ours now, to carry on. To build the world where our sisters are not taken. To fight for change that will see the pillars our misfortune shaken.

We tell the stories you can no longer tell. We sing the songs you can no longer hear. We strike the drum that our children might remember, might know that they are ours just as were you. Might feel the life of the nation to which they belong and know that we fight for them. Just as we fought for you.

Tears stain the page as I write, little sisters. Tears for all that was lost when you were taken from the light of the sun. Tears for those who no longer stand on Turtle’s back. Tears for those who still remain separate and locked away from their people.

When the fanfare has ended. When the news has moved on. We remain. The ones left behind by your going. We do not fight for your memory, for the world that will be because we are told to. We do not struggle to protect all that will come after, all that has come before, for the hope of being remembered. We do not change our chants, nor still our feet when the attention of the masses is grabbed by something new.

Your loss inspires us to fight. To rage against the world that we did not create.

Your memory inspires us to tell our stories. To shout into the world that we are still here. To show the world that we remember.

Cruel though it may seem, I cannot but wish that you are dead. A blessing, I would call it, to not suffer at the hands of those who took you, as do many of the living like you.

Rest now, little sisters.

Your loss, your spirit, your memory, your songs, your dance, your journey is done now. And those of who remain fight for you. For the next seven generations.

Rest now and know that you are not forgotten. That we fight for you and all those who come after.

Signed,

One who remembers.

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Submission length 783 words.

Context:

The red dress is the symbol of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. They are our lost sisters, and they inspire me to act. To tell my stories in my own voice, though there are always those who seek to silence us.

MMIWG represent the highest number of missing and murdered women and girls in the world compared to their population. They are taken for reasons I will never understand, both by settlers and vile persons within our own Nations. There is no strict divide between the demographics that take them from us. No single group that is fully to blame.

Though the world moves on, though the news cycle does not rest long on them for there is too much horror in the world to do so, we can never forget them. We will never forget them. We shall never forget them.

The 5th of May is red dress day. If at no other time our lost sisters cross your mind, remember them then. Remember their loss and weep for it. We will still be fighting, though they can never come home. Remember them, and as do I, let their absence from our circles - the holes torn in our families by evil action - inspire you to act. To join with us and keep the next seven generations safe.