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mudaship39 · 2 years

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Heart of Fire Dragon, Soul of Flame Phoenix, and Sea Fairy Ocean Blood.

A Spoken Word Poetry Book about being a displaced disconnected state side diaspora, an Asian Native Pasifika, and a queer and trans Indigenous person of color

Chapter 4: Verse 1: Deafening Quiet:

Ever since I could remember

Ever since I was a child

Every night in my dreams

I have always heard an earth voice

I have always heard an ocean song

A voice of fire and a song of flame that sounds serene, tranquil, calm, & melodic

An ocean song voice that was matriarchal, loving, & kind

An earth voice that was paternal, protective, & caring

A song that somehow sounds like the very ocean itself

A voice that somehow sounds like the very earth itself

An ocean song that sounds so recognizable to me

As a Southeast Asian Vietnamese and East Asian Chinese person of color

An earth voice that sounds so familiar to me

As a Kinh Indigenous and Polynesian Tahitian Indigenous Pasifika

She is calling to me and saying that I am her long lost maohi/raerae child

One that was stolen from her a very long time ago

Taken from the earth, the ocean, & the sky

As a displaced stateside disconnected diaspora

I know her voice but I do not know her face

I know her song but I do not know her touch

I know her voice but I do not know her embrace

I know her song but I do not know her bond

The land and the sea ever since he/she/they were a child

She has called them every night in their dreams

Her long lost maohi or raerae child long ago that was stolen from her

A child with a body made of earth, made of ocean, & made of sky

She calls to them with her earth voice

She calls to them with her ocean song

The land and the sea however she weeps and she grieves She grieves because her long lost child does not know her tongue

The land and the sea though every single night she weeps

The land and the sea though every single day she mourns

She mourns because her child born of fire, flame, & water does not understand her voice

She mourns because her child born with a body made of earth, ocean, & sky does not comprehend her songs

Still she calls to me her son, her daughter, & her nonbinary child who is mahu/maohi

I am a child sitting on a beach playing in the sand

Because it always feels like home to me

As someone stolen from the earth, the sky, & the ocean

A very long time ago As displaced stateside disconnected diaspora

The land and the seas has always called to me

Ever since I was a child

She has always spoken to me

She has always sang to me

But I did not answer her

Her long lost child

That was stolen from her a long time ago

I didn’t answer her because she spoke in a tongue that I didn’t understand

She called to me with her earth voice

She called to me with her ocean song

An ocean song voice that was matriarchal, loving, & kind

An earth voice that was paternal, protective, & caring

A song that somehow sounds like the very ocean itself

A voice that somehow sounds like the very earth itself

An ocean song that sounds so recognizable to me

As a Southeast Asian Vietnamese, European French, and East Asian Chinese person of color

An earth voice that sounds so familiar to me

As a Polynesian Tahitian Indigenous Pasifika and Kinh Indigenous person

I cried upon hearing her earth voice and her ocean song

I am here Christian Nguyen she says

She calls me by my English name

She the ocean my ancestral mother

She washed away my cosmic sea fairy ocean tears

When she brushed them away from my eyes With her hand made of earth ocean water

She embraced me

To comfort me as I cried in her arms

She is calling to me and saying that I am her long lost child

One that was stolen from her a very long time ago

As a displaced state side disconnected diaspora

I am a young adult now

No longer a child

But still in need of a mother’s advice

Am I Pasifika enough

I ask the ocean

Cuz someone had the audacity to spout blood quantum

Saying I wasn't a true Pasifika cuz Im not pureblood

Or not Pasifika cuz Im mixed Asian

Like I am not an Asian native

I don't count myself in fractions, parts, or pieces

I count myself in wholes

Am I Pasifika enough I ask the demigod Maui

Who says how dare they have you questioning your own cultural identity

Like the sky father, ocean mother, & earth mother didn’t mold you out of their own essence

As a child born out of earth, ocean, & sky

Born out of fire, flame, & water

Taking the heart of a fire dragon

Taking the soul of a flame phoenix

Taking the aura of a sea fairy

And putting both fire and water into a demigod body

The land and the seas has been calling me home for a long time

But I didn't answer her

I ignored her cuz I was still embarrassed of being an Asian Native

So much self hate as an Indigenous person of color

Ingrained in me by years of racism and anti native racism

But she didn’t hold it against me

The land and the sea

She listened to my tears

For years she listened as I cried

To an invisible Ocean Mother

Wishing I was not born a brown Asian Native

And she wept her own

For years she listened as I lamented not being able to return home

As a low income poor and disabled

Displaced disconnected diaspora

I am a now an adult standing on the beach

Finally listening to the earth voice and the ocean song for the first time

She says I would say hello Christian Nguyen

But that is your English name

Not your Vietnamese Hoa or Kinh Indigenous birth name

Not your chosen Polynesian Tahitian Indigenous Pasifika name

They are not your preferred names Names have power

So I will say hello my child Hello Ngoc Dinh Nguyen

Hello No’eau Aitonui Hoata when you are masc or kane

Hello Heiani Mareva Hoata when you are femme or vahine

She says she has searched across the land and the sea for a long time to find me

Her mahu or maohi in the middle child

I who am sometimes her son

I who am sometimes her daughter

I who am always her nonbinary child

I her child who is maohi or raerae

Her child however refuses to speak

Her child however refuses to sing

I can no longer speak and sing

I no longer answer them

My ancestors who ask to hear me speak

My ancestors who ask to hear me sing

With my voice of fire

With my song of flame

As a storykeeper, orator, & storyteller

She flinches back in hurt

She cries ocean tears

She can no longer hear the voice and song of her maohi or raerae child

A voice of fire and a song of flame that sounds serene, tranquil, calm, & melodic

A voice and a song she has heard for so long

She just wants to hear the voice and song of her child who is a storykeeper, orator, & storyteller

Please speak…

With your voice of fire

Please sing…

With your song of flame

She asks of me weeping ocean tears

Her child born of fire, flame, & water

Her child with a body of earth, ocean, & sky

Her child who is a hybrid of a fire dragon, a sea fae, & a flame phoenix

Her child with bones made out of jade

Her child with roots made out of white lotus flowers and hibiscus plants

I saw her ocean tears but I still didn’t respond

I say I am sorry but I don’t know how anymore

They robbed me of my voice of fire

They stole from me my song of flame

I am sitting in front of altar that I built for my Tahitian gods and goddesses that I pray to and worship

An altar to my people's goddess of joy Rearea

To Ihi my people’s goddess of wisdom and learning

To my people’s goddess of healing Ai-tupuai

I can not talk to my Polynesian polytheistic gods and goddesses

They speak French and they speak Tahitian for obvious reasons

They speak our Polynesian Indigenous Pasifika Tahitian

They speak the colonizer’s and imperialist’s French

I can not talk to them because it was stolen from me by cultural genocide and inter generational trauma

I cannot understand them because was taken from me

I hate most monotheist religion

For cultural genocide of forced conversion of indigenous peoples

My ancestors don’t have kin with your god

We have our own spirits and deities thank you very much

Your missionaries disconnected us from them

Now all we hear know is silence...

As a displaced state side disconnected Polynesian Indigenous Pasifika diaspora

My Tahitian kupuna or elders every night in my dreams tell me to speak Tahitian to them

But the knowledge of how to speak Tahitian was ripped from my mouth a long time ago

As a displaced state side disconnected diaspora

That was stolen from the earth, the ocean, & the sky

My mouth can still taste the blood of Tahitian words that cultural genocide has robbed from me So my mouth mourns and my tongue grieves a language it does not know how to speak

I spit out the blood of those stolen words on the faces of colonizers and imperialists

I ask them to learn how to speak Vietnamese and Chinese

So they can speak and whisper to my Vietnamese and Chinese ancestors

I ask them to learn how to speak Vietnamese and English so they can talk and sing to me

Their child with a body made of earth, ocean, & sky

Their child born of fire, flame, & water

Their child who is a fire dragon, flame phoenix, & sea fairy hybrid

Their child with bones made out of jade

Their child with roots made out of white lotus flowers and hibiscus plants

I wonder if they feel shame and embarrassment that their child can’t even speak their tongue?

Or do they just feel sorrow and torment that their child so badly wants to speak to them

But doesn’t have any kupuna or elders to teach them how?

That their descendant does not have any family or whanau to teach them how to properly pray

That their heir doesn't know how to be a storykeeper, orator, or storyteller

That their descendant doesn't know how to be a mahu or maohi elder and healer

Cuz they have no hapua or clan taught them how

I see the tears of my Tahitian ancestors

Who were beaten for not speaking the colonizer French

I see the tears of my Tahitian ancestors

Who were punished for speaking Indigenous Tahitian

I see the tears of my Tahitian ancestors Who had their traditional tattoos banned by French colonizers and imperialists I see the tears of my Tahitian ancestors

Who were forcibly converted from their Indigenous Pasifika polytheistic pagan spirituality

To Catholicism by French missionaries

I see the tears of my maohi Polynesian Tahitian Pasifika third gender elders

Who had their cultural identities and gender identities banned by French colonizers

They are crying tears of earth, ocean, & sky

I see the tears of my Vietnamese or Kinh Indigenous ancestors

Who had their Indigenous language warped and perverted by Chinese colonizers and French imperialists

I see the tears of my Vietnamese or Kinh Indigneous ancestors

Who were enslaved and exploited by the French imperialists

I see the tears of my Vietnamese or Kinh Indigenous ancestors

Who were beaten, whipped, & chained by French colonizers

They were victims of Blackbirding

Or kidnapping, exploitation, & enslavement of Indigenous people from our Indigenous lands

I see the tears of my Vietnamese or Kinh Indigenous ancestors

Who were forcibly converted from their Vietnamese Indigneous Kinh folk spirituality

To Buddhism and Catholicism by Chinese monks and French missionaries

They are crying tears of fire, flame, & water

They see me their descendant crying blood tears of inter generational trauma out of my eyes

I hear their silent screams and they hear mine!

Being displaced disconnected state side diaspora has robbed so much from me

Cultural genocide has stolen so much from me

I am born of displaced disconnected diaspora of two Indigenous groups

Both of my people speak the same language even if they don’t know it

They both speak generational trauma

They both speak cultural genocide

They both understand what it is like being forcibly converted

They both know what it's like to have their culture, customs, traditions, & spirituality banned

They both understand what it is like being under the boots of subjugation, oppression, & tyranny

They both know what it is like to be under colonialism, imperialism, neocolonialism, & occupation

They know what it is like to have Indigenous children who are disconnected displaced diaspora

I tell my Polynesian ancestors or na kupuna that I want to properly pray to my Polynesian Indigneous Pasifika gods and goddesses

I tell my Vietnamese or Kinh Indigneous ancestors that I want to properly venerate the spirits of my ancestors

Please know I want to so badly but cultural genocide has stolen so much from me

Please know I want to so badly but being displaced state side disconnected diaspora has robbed so much from me

Dear ancestors or na kupuna

As your heir, as your descendant, as your child

I am sorry that I was ashamed of you

I am sorry that I was ever ashamed of myself

I am sorry that I was ever embarrassed of my racial identities

Of being Southeast Asian Vietnamese and East Asian Chinese

I am sorry that I was ever embarrassed of my cultural identities

Of being Polynesian Tahitian Indigenous Pasifika

Of being Kinh Indigenous of Vietnam

I beg your forgiveness

And I forgive myself

#spokenword #slam poetry #ndn art #indigenous art #indigenous #indigenouswriter #Pasifika #Polynesian #poetry

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irawhiti · 2 years

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hi happy waitangi day!

if you're white and ESPECIALLY if you're a pākehā aotearoa new zealander feeling guilty about colonising my people and running my family out of the country we're indigenous to, i'm accepting donations <3

i'm currently living with a family of racist white people because it was either that or become homeless, i have no license so i'm dependent on them to take me places which they haven't been great about and there's literally no public transport where i am. i had about $800 stolen from me literally on christmas day and owe money to my sister so i could pay rent over that time, but most importantly right now my laptop has been shutting off at random for weeks now and it took 20 minutes just to get it to start up a few days ago. it's shut off at least 5 times while i've been writing this. it's already been on its last legs for awhile now and i'm getting real nervous because if i lose access to a computer i'll get cut off of my only source of income since it becomes a Lot more difficult for me to apply for jobs and keep in contact with my job network to stay on centrelink money + i won't be able to apply for work-at-home jobs. i only make $300 a fortnight from centrelink because they're STILL keeping me on dependent allowance which i'm sorting out and $200 of that goes to rent alone, so even if i don't get cut off i Really cannot afford a laptop right now.

also i got the flu over christmas (potentially covid, there was a positive case in the house at the same time, but who fucking knows lol, these people refuse to take me to covid tests until after i'm already recovering) and now i have bronchitis (i had to buy 6 rapid covid test that got brought up by my sister for $70 and split 3 with her, the people i live with refused to take me to get a pcr test despite me coughing up blood at one point 🙃). i've got asthma and several disablities that mess with my breathing so i really cannot catch a break here, i've been waking up in the middle of the night unable to breathe so needless to say i've been kind of struggling with getting all my legal stuff sorted while this has been happening.

so like, if you wanna help out a disabled māori living in australia for waitangi day, any money helps! i really need a couple hundred dollars for a decent enough laptop to stay afloat and keep drawing (meaning i can't just buy a shitty $50 laptop unfortunately, it has to be decent enough for me to draw and take commissions so i'm looking at over $500 aud for a laptop with good enough graphics, i can pay for some of it but i can't afford that shit on my own :/). i'll update the post if i get donations and any extra money i might get will go towards buying medication and getting more of my teeth fixed, they're hurting like hell again and it's hard to eat and i'd like to get more work done but right now i've gotta choose between being able to get government money and spending money to be able to eat without pain lol

(also i have to use my friend's paypal because paypal screwed me over a few years ago, if you could leave a message to make it clear it's for me so we can keep track easier it'd help a lot <3 thank you)

paypal.me/hoodypet

$0/$500

#indigenous #maori #pasifika #signal boost #donations #donation #mutual aid #waitangi day #crowdfunding #new zealand #aotearoa

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