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    Honi Soit
    Home»Creative

    There is a softness

    Words by Sophia Chakma Hill.
    By Sophia Chakma HillMay 31, 2021 Creative 2 Mins Read
    Art by Oli Mcauslan
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    There is a softness in the way 
    the way you tell them to care about the environment, its enough to be Indigenous 
    your soft words hide the sharp edges 
    your love for my mother brought you back to me
    asking for my words, my blood 
    as my mothers was too red and sliked through your fingers 
    In a way I respect you 
    the way you weave your soft words 
    into a beautiful Indigeous that anyone can wear
    do you think that just because they can put it on they will protect us? 
    that they can wear it and the pain beneath our skin will 
    disappear 
    for the pain they caused we will gift them our identity, so when their blades cut into our stomachs, they can look soft too 
    you asked me to write you a letter so you could use it and take it as your own 
    to show a history of what was to prove that you have changed perhaps
    I will tell you a secret 
    my blood is sharp and as it drips through your fingers you will bleed as mine does
    if I gave my blood to the coloniser they could drink it down and become more thirsty
    you with your burkley education and your masculinity, you may be closer to them than my mother every could be 
    but you are Indigenous. Don’t give that away to 
    anyone. It won’t protect you or her, or us.

    This poem was published in ‘Embers’, a pullout in Honi’s Semester 1, Week 11 edition.

    Embers 2021 environment indigenous poetry

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