Shé:kon sewakwé:kon, greetings all. If you can, take some time outside today and experience all that is ready to greet you.
This season brings hope for brighter days. More sunlight, warmer temperatures, the sounds and colour of new and reemerging life. This time encourages imagination, expansion, and forward momentum.
As we wrap up April, we also wrap up National Poetry Month. This was a busy month for me as poet laureate. It also marks a year into my two-year term. I have one more year to take advantage of this platform and hopefully leave a lasting influence.
I have met many inspiring creatives who have shared generously with me over the past year. I have been touched by the love infused into their craft and the honesty poured into it.
Last week, Ty the Poetess, Barrie’s Poet Laureate, brought massive talent to Collingwood’s Simcoe Street Theatre alongside local artists. The event brought generations together to explore rap and the hip-hop culture’s origins in poetry. It was humbling to be a part of that lineup.
The role has come with many blessings. It also comes with immense pressure and self-doubt. I cannot be anything but grateful for the growth that comes with all of it.
The stories and the teachings of my culture have been a significant influence on my art and writings.
Mother Earth, the land, is our teacher. From an Indigenous perspective, the land holds the stories, the history, the lessons across time – past, present, and future. And therefore, our values, worldviews, and creations are informed by the land.
She is a knowledge keeper, our tie to ancestral and ancient history. Our roots are the means to accessing the learning from all that has been. We must care for her in order to care for all of that precious wisdom and lived experience she holds. It is the responsibility of each one of us to make sure that the love she gives is reciprocated.
We have to look to the past, learn about where we come from to bring light to the path ahead. What have we learned from the dark places we have been? We don’t want to revisit those places.
In honour of National Poetry Month, this inspiring season, and our Mother Earth, I will share one of my pieces.
AS SHE LOVES
Humble yourself, let ego fall away
Lay upon the earth close your eyes
feel the rhythm of the land
Listen to your mother’s heartbeat
Greeting you with knowing
Re-enter the womb in your mind
Comforted as if your years are few
Giver of teachings of unconditional love
She offers grace despite our misgivings
The trees begin their dance
filling our vision with colour
only to sacrifice that beauty for new life
The winds, the waters carrying the seeds of tomorrow
All following their natural instructions
Honouring an inherent role
all our relations, our kin, our teachers
Do you hear them, do you see them?
They love without discrimination
They love as she loves
Awaken her teachings, your sacred duty
Love as she loves
Skén:nen, peace.
Jillian Morris is Kanien’kehá:ka, turtle clan and band member of Six Nations of the Grand River Territory now living in Collingwood, and serving as the town's poet laureate. She will be sharing stories and experience passed down through the oral traditions of Kanien’kehá:ka culture in her regular column, entitled Ka’nikonhrí:io, (The Good Mind) published on CollingwoodToday.ca.
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