RUNNER UP: before dispossession there was just soil

The poem “before dispossession there was just soil” contains yearning, music, and imagination. To me, there is a subversive resistance in its beautiful lines—lines such as “what if it was meant only / to support a hoof or / the indent of a crow’s foot.”

—Doyali Islam

“Reconciliation includes anyone with an open mind and an open heart who is willing to look into the future with a new way.”—Chief Robert Joseph

what if this land
was not laced with rows
not fraught with trellised vines

what if this torn surface
was not coaxed into offering
fruit or the dying
sweetness or splendour

what if it was meant only
to support a hoof or
the indent of a crow’s foot not
a mouth
tamped with transgressions

what if the soil heaved itself
into your hands
and the sky laughed out loud
at this infestation of bees infectious
as the feeble caws echoing off clouds
the fragility of anemone blooming white
as dawn as ever

what if we knew
we were never good at survival
knew too well this land
could never be conquered

this land throbbing with
endless haptic feedback
plants as placeholders
for the grip and grind of time
surface as membrane
body as loam
punctured with wild phlox
growing new eyes
a tree a rock a segment of icons in sky
settling no truth in place