TASHA’S TRUTH
(We see men as shadows, moving into position. There is a white man in a business suit. There is a white man in paramilitary uniform. There is a (Indian or White) man in policeman’s uniform. There are two young Indian men. There is an older Indian woman. They all carry pistols. There is a young Indian woman kneeling at the edge of the stage. The light rises on her. It is daybreak.)
TASHA
Creator Father, Earth Mother if this is to be my last day of life, grant me this request. I don’t want anyone to take my life, to snuff it out like a candle. If I am to die, I give my life freely for The People and my children, in exchange for their freedom, for their healing. May my name burn with the fire of youth and power and truth, all that I sacrifice. I have served you faithfully and I have done everything you have asked of me. I left the home of my Ancestors and traveled to this harsh land. I have stood between these beautiful people and the ones who want to kill them. I did not run when fear and suspicion turned my way. I am not what they say. I am not a traitor. I held my ground and carried this burden that you gave to me. It was all for my children, that they might be free. Light the pathway for my children so they won’t get lost or forget who they are. They are Native, born from Mother Earth. Let them walk forever in love. Don’t let them know hurt or harm. Keep me in their hearts. Let them understand that everything I did, I did for them. I leave my life force and all the love in my heart for my people and my children.
(The shadow people raise their weapons and fire.)
(Lights black out.)
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Friday, January 19, 2007
FOR THE LOVE OF WHALES
You called your gods of death and destruction
To bury our village in blood and guts
To drown us in our own pride and culture
And capture the souls of those you had judged
Your curse circled the world for all to hear
Like a frightened sparrow sent into combat
With the spirit guardian of my blood
Who rose to meet the small pitiful thing
I sing and dance in ancient agreement
For the love of the one who dies to feed me
I will forever live in her power
She will live forever in my spirit
You and I could throw power for ten days
In a Spiritual War of light and dark
The skies would thunder with our hate and fears
Mother Earth would shudder in deep sorrow
You howl your virtuous creeds and hexes
As I raise the protectors of this land
The Creator weeps for all the children
Locked in lost battle for the love of whales
To bury our village in blood and guts
To drown us in our own pride and culture
And capture the souls of those you had judged
Your curse circled the world for all to hear
Like a frightened sparrow sent into combat
With the spirit guardian of my blood
Who rose to meet the small pitiful thing
I sing and dance in ancient agreement
For the love of the one who dies to feed me
I will forever live in her power
She will live forever in my spirit
You and I could throw power for ten days
In a Spiritual War of light and dark
The skies would thunder with our hate and fears
Mother Earth would shudder in deep sorrow
You howl your virtuous creeds and hexes
As I raise the protectors of this land
The Creator weeps for all the children
Locked in lost battle for the love of whales
HISTORY
(for Paul Watson)
What is the past the sage asked the student?
Does it fade like mist in the glaring sun?
Is it scrawled in sand as the tide turns?
Is it a perfectly woven basket
preserved in a mud slide until needed?
Is it the hunched brown woman with bright eyes?
Her cragged face is the face of Mother Earth.
Do you wear time as a stink albatross
Rotting with your sins and redemptions.
Is age the red rose you planted last year
Lush and fragrant with your tribute of love
Will your words be sung by your grandchildren
or be born as a curse mumbling in the dark?
What is the past the sage asked the student?
Does it fade like mist in the glaring sun?
Is it scrawled in sand as the tide turns?
Is it a perfectly woven basket
preserved in a mud slide until needed?
Is it the hunched brown woman with bright eyes?
Her cragged face is the face of Mother Earth.
Do you wear time as a stink albatross
Rotting with your sins and redemptions.
Is age the red rose you planted last year
Lush and fragrant with your tribute of love
Will your words be sung by your grandchildren
or be born as a curse mumbling in the dark?
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
PAUL WATSON
THE SEASHEPHERD
AND POLITICALY CORRECT RACISM
(a parody of his parody of "The Walrus and the Carpenter")
by Monica J Charles
(A VETERAN OF WOUNDED KNEE 1973
The Shepherd slithered upon the sea
Painted with Killer Whales
Who do understand the hunt
He played tapes of their hunting songs
Not knowing what they said
As pods of Orca gathered
The Makah silently ignored him
And prayed for his eyes and heart to open
To the sacred circle of life
But he made too much money
Playing cowboys and Indians
Howling racist stereotypes
"You alcoholics and drug users!"
He screamed on the front pages
He didn't say it was his government
That gave these t o us for genocide
So they could steal our resources
It was they who endangered the gray
"I'm not a racist!" He bellowed for the TV
"I was the medic at Wounded Knee in 1973
The REAL veterans phoned each other perplexed
"I don't remember this guy, do you?"
"The medic was tall, skinny, handsome and black."
"Were you an FBI agent Paul? Are you now?
Pods of Killer Whales gather in council
To figure out this abberation
The sounds of a hunt and gray whales dying
When no such thing was happening
A warning Paul, you'd better listen good
You can't play with the Spirit without paying
He conned a lonely elder
into abandoning her traditional wisdom
And parroting his words instead
"You're the good Indian. They're the bad."
"Come with me, I'll make it worth your while,"
"If you tell the world, The Makah are tainted."
But the Whalers maintained discipline
They paddled each day out to sea
"Bare chested warriors!" He leered to the press.
But who's the savage? Who's the gentleman?
Who did not answer hate with hate?
Who turned the other cheek?
"The time has come," the racist said
"To crow and shout and spin."
"They survived our smallpox and alcohol."
"But we'll call it their sin."
"Their Treaty we'll destroy
Then throw it in the trash bin."
"But hold on now," the shepherds wailed
"Real Indians should paint their face!"
"And tie feathers in their braided hair."
Okay Paul, let's play fair!
Put on your kilt, paint yourself blue.
Where's your 18th century ship?
An anti-tank gun, the shepherd lied
Another time an elephant gun
"I'll use whatever image
will bleed your hearts and wallets
They're on welfare not me!
Just send me money! More money"
"I know what's best!" did the shepherd cry
For my skin is white
"A new industry for you,
Cameras not harpoons
Look over there while I dump my bilge
You didn't see Jonathon strike a whale!
"It seems a shame," The shepherd said,
"The lies and hate didn't work."
"They got their whale on live TV"
All the Tribes did rejoice.
They came to the feast from Fiji and Africa.
Nothing we did could stop it."
"In Port Angeles they marched
To stop the hate
I tried so hard to generate."
The world is evolving Paul
Despite your machinations
Love always overcomes fear.
There were no Samurai
That was another racist ploy
To create a backlash of white fear,
While Killer Whales are dying
And Nuclear plants reopen
Are you an agent from some secret government cell?
AND POLITICALY CORRECT RACISM
(a parody of his parody of "The Walrus and the Carpenter")
by Monica J Charles
(A VETERAN OF WOUNDED KNEE 1973
The Shepherd slithered upon the sea
Painted with Killer Whales
Who do understand the hunt
He played tapes of their hunting songs
Not knowing what they said
As pods of Orca gathered
The Makah silently ignored him
And prayed for his eyes and heart to open
To the sacred circle of life
But he made too much money
Playing cowboys and Indians
Howling racist stereotypes
"You alcoholics and drug users!"
He screamed on the front pages
He didn't say it was his government
That gave these t o us for genocide
So they could steal our resources
It was they who endangered the gray
"I'm not a racist!" He bellowed for the TV
"I was the medic at Wounded Knee in 1973
The REAL veterans phoned each other perplexed
"I don't remember this guy, do you?"
"The medic was tall, skinny, handsome and black."
"Were you an FBI agent Paul? Are you now?
Pods of Killer Whales gather in council
To figure out this abberation
The sounds of a hunt and gray whales dying
When no such thing was happening
A warning Paul, you'd better listen good
You can't play with the Spirit without paying
He conned a lonely elder
into abandoning her traditional wisdom
And parroting his words instead
"You're the good Indian. They're the bad."
"Come with me, I'll make it worth your while,"
"If you tell the world, The Makah are tainted."
But the Whalers maintained discipline
They paddled each day out to sea
"Bare chested warriors!" He leered to the press.
But who's the savage? Who's the gentleman?
Who did not answer hate with hate?
Who turned the other cheek?
"The time has come," the racist said
"To crow and shout and spin."
"They survived our smallpox and alcohol."
"But we'll call it their sin."
"Their Treaty we'll destroy
Then throw it in the trash bin."
"But hold on now," the shepherds wailed
"Real Indians should paint their face!"
"And tie feathers in their braided hair."
Okay Paul, let's play fair!
Put on your kilt, paint yourself blue.
Where's your 18th century ship?
An anti-tank gun, the shepherd lied
Another time an elephant gun
"I'll use whatever image
will bleed your hearts and wallets
They're on welfare not me!
Just send me money! More money"
"I know what's best!" did the shepherd cry
For my skin is white
"A new industry for you,
Cameras not harpoons
Look over there while I dump my bilge
You didn't see Jonathon strike a whale!
"It seems a shame," The shepherd said,
"The lies and hate didn't work."
"They got their whale on live TV"
All the Tribes did rejoice.
They came to the feast from Fiji and Africa.
Nothing we did could stop it."
"In Port Angeles they marched
To stop the hate
I tried so hard to generate."
The world is evolving Paul
Despite your machinations
Love always overcomes fear.
There were no Samurai
That was another racist ploy
To create a backlash of white fear,
While Killer Whales are dying
And Nuclear plants reopen
Are you an agent from some secret government cell?
THE REINCARNATION OF GEORGE ARMSTRONG CUSTER
A black ship sneaks out of the seething mists
Booming shrieks of orca slaying gray whales
A new steed and battle song for pogroms
For survivors of small pox and liquor
His bullets are words of racial hatred
His new black plague is disinformation
A drop of truth in a gallon of lies
George staged his crusade on the front pages
In pompous headlines and action photos
Of blackships and jet skis and zodiacs
Swarming a lone hand-carved whaling canoe
"Little Johnny" missed the final battle
He committed a high seas felony
His pony trampled a trusting gray whale
George lost his hair again at Neah Bay
When the Makah harpooned their first gray whale
And took us to the new millenium
As real Indians like our ancestors
Booming shrieks of orca slaying gray whales
A new steed and battle song for pogroms
For survivors of small pox and liquor
His bullets are words of racial hatred
His new black plague is disinformation
A drop of truth in a gallon of lies
George staged his crusade on the front pages
In pompous headlines and action photos
Of blackships and jet skis and zodiacs
Swarming a lone hand-carved whaling canoe
"Little Johnny" missed the final battle
He committed a high seas felony
His pony trampled a trusting gray whale
George lost his hair again at Neah Bay
When the Makah harpooned their first gray whale
And took us to the new millenium
As real Indians like our ancestors
Monday, January 15, 2007
THE LEGACY
I've given your name
To my teddy bear
I call him friend
I share my troubles
He let's me cry
Until I feel better
I hold him at night
When I am afraid
When he reminds
me too much of you
I beat the shit out of him
To my teddy bear
I call him friend
I share my troubles
He let's me cry
Until I feel better
I hold him at night
When I am afraid
When he reminds
me too much of you
I beat the shit out of him
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