Orange Shirt Day & National Truth and Reconciliation Day

Today is the third annual National Truth and Reconciliation Day and the tenth annual Orange Shirt Day.

For those who may not know, here's a quick rundown. Residential Schools in Canada where meant to take in Indigenous Children of Turtle Island (Canada) and strip them of their heritage and ways of life, ultimately eliminating their culture. In 1973, a young six-year-old girl named Phyllis Webstad entered the St. Joseph Mission Residential School in Williams Lake, British Columbia, she was forced to remove her favourite new orange shirt that her grandmother had bought her, along with everything else. Phyllis is just one unfortunate story and example of over 150,000. Phyllis' story is what inspired Orange Shirt Day. 

There is also the famous story of 12-year-old Chanie Wenjack, among thousands more. See Gord Downie's hit song "Secret Path" here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=za2VzjkwtFc.

In honour of today, I wanted to share a poem I wrote a couple years ago. Enjoy!

Ghost from the Past

By Vickram Bachan

 

An ancient dialect forcefully silenced,

Oppressed and intended to be extinguished;

Believed to have been dead and extinct long ago. 

But amid the crimes of abuse, and violence, and hate,

it endured and thrived back into life,

Back into the open.

Not eradicated but vindicated.

The descendants of an ancient people 

Fighting for their ancestors,

And fighting for justice, 

Wanting to reclaim what was once rightfully theirs,

What was stolen from them;

But also willing to forgive,

If the other side is willing to reconcile.

The truth has been unearthed,

And the bloodstained lies of the past exposed.

Their stories have changed the history books

And made them more accurate.

The fantastical fables of our ‘amazing’ origins

Shoved down our throats 

now proven to be false.

Apologies have been made 

for the genocide and discrimination,

But there is still much work to be done.

Wronged, so very wronged,

Yet they are willing to forgive,

If the other side is willing to reconcile.