<Prompt 23: Write a Poem: “I Shouldn’t Be Here”>

Today we took the children to the Hans Herr House and took the tour through the Longhouse.  The Longhouse at the Herr House was recreated as closely as possible to the remains of one unearthed in Washington Boro, where we used to farm.

So this is on my mind as I look at this poem prompt tonight.  I am stealing my friend Natasha’s ceremonial refrain for the ending of the poem.

I Shouldn’t Be Here

And neither, perhaps, should you.  Or you.
How shall I place this shame in context?

It wasn’t my pigs who brought the plague
that wiped out the thousand Caddoan villages
along the Mississippi.  Nor my gold-lust
that cut off the hands and the tongues
of those who would not yield me tribute.

I did not rush in with the unrighteous mob
when the Paxtang Boys tore down the doors
and killed the last Conestoga villagers.

How have we come to speak so glibly of genocide?

They had no concept, see, of land ownership,
and our own greed had built into a towering need.

They helped us live, you know,
when our own were starving.
We could not have been so bad,
if they helped us then.
And we have immortalized them
with gratitude, so that makes up
a little of the difference.

I shouldn’t be here, but I am,
here in history, here in this place.
And beneath my feet, the bones
of the People Who Came Before.

What can I offer as a token,
as my plea for forgiveness?

A small piece of quartz tossed
into the River which fed them,
Three seeds in the soil
which grew their livelihood:
a bean, a corn kernel, a gourd.
A feather tossed into the wind,
like the eagles who flew above
the myriad villages of the People.

I am sorry.
Please forgive me.

Gratitude List:
1.  A lovely afternoon of learning with friends, honoring the People Who Came Before.
2.  The faery oak tree on the corner of Water and James in Lancaster.
3.  The sentinel dawn redwoods on Ducktown Road.
4.  Popcorn
5.  Center

May we walk in Beauty.