~ by Patrick W. Kavanagh
(For Standing Rock)
It is a good day to die,
I shall proudly hold my head up high, beneath my father in the sky.
and I shall stand and fight this day…although it is my last.
I will no longer fear the future, neither will I mourn the past.
My feet are firm upon my mother’s earth,
and reaching down I take a pinch of sacred dirt,
My father’s dust shall be the paint I wear this final day.
And I will die before I let them drag me far away.
This is my land,
And here is where I make my stand,
It’s bounty I have shared with kin of scale and skin and fur,
There are no tears left in this broken heart, and I shall weep no more.
I shall not leave this place,
I shall not live in misery and in disgrace.
My ancestors and I will sit and talk this night,
For I will pour my blood upon the earth before the dying of the light.
And now I mount my horse and ride into the roar of many guns,
See how her flanks are painted with my palms and red with my own blood.
We helped them in their hour of need and now behind the guns, I see them stood,-
The children of the children, that the parents of my parents, should have shunned.
From beyond the clouds, Grandfather sky calls out my name,
“Take heart, my son, our time has passed, but it will come again”
One day the buffalo will fill the land again, and we will feast and live in peace,
White Buffalo will come and all four colours of mankind unite and heal the Earth again.
I weep no more.
Beautiful poem