Trail of Tears

They don't have the Maypop

Like we did in Alabama.

Neither does the Toothwort bloom.

Oklahoma is too far west.

The only thing it has in common

With our old home is briars.

We eat the tops. They are edible,

But everything else our grandmother taught us is wrong now.

No familiar plants, we don't know now

What is poisonous.

We have walked, the forced march,

And they say soon

We will arrive at the settlement Talequah.

Nothing we were ever taught

Will help us now in this new place.

Nothing about the plants.

Nothing about the way to live.

They say we will not be able to tell our stories anymore,

But maybe they don't matter anyway,

And even using our native language

May be considered a crime.

Grandmother told us that as women,

We owned the home,

We owned the children,

But now there is no security for women,

Except being nice, being coy

To the soldiers for favor,

And we can't even wander out into the wilds by ourselves,

And know what to eat to survive on our own anymore.

-jenn