You speak
Sins of the Fathers
Visited upon children
In the name of righteousness.
People
And cultures destroyed
By moral crusades
For your "God"
Of love and compassion.
Unrepentantly justified
Religious belief
Bringing civilization
To these heathen savages.
Of unmarked
Abandoned mass graves
In isolated residential schools
Throughout the north.
Echoing
Into the present
As entire communities
Struggle for survival
And identify.
Tears I shed
For our Indigenous
Brothers and sisters
Denied their birthright
By Western society.
As they fight
Long and hard
To reclaim
What was stolen.
Of lost lives
We'll never know
Their name
To properly honour them.
As we remember
Our murdered siblings.
Regardless
Of skin colour
And religious beliefs
On November 20th
Day of Transgender Remembrance.
May their souls
Find peace
So long denied
In life.
Therisa © 2019
Author’s note: Remembering our Indigenous brothers and sisters, who have for too long been tossed away, left to deal with the fall out of the colonization of their culture and religious beliefs.
