Coming back to identity part of traditional seasons poetry collection

Lightning in Our Roots, the debut collection of poetry for Avis Blackbird (a pen name), is ordered by the five traditional Secwepmec seasonal rounds, which dictate how life is lived around nature. 

The collection begins with the “pre-reflection” and reflection that occur during the two fall seasons, which she combines as a single seasonal round. The poems journey from the arrival of settlers and the impact of colonization to secret rebellion to reclaiming stories and land to fighting back, quiet resilience and resistance to rising up, survival, taking control and resurgence.

“As an Indigenous writer, I think it's really important to acknowledge and have…the history and the intergenerational trauma that affects us all be a piece of our work,” said Blackbird, who is Secwepemc and Sto:lo and of mixed European heritage. “But I also feel it's really important that doesn't define us.”

Her collection concludes on the strength of the spring and summer seasons and the coming together of tribes. 

In “Powwows Made Me Love Yellow,” she writes, “But Powwows bring a burst of colour/A spectrum that feels specific to us/The harmony of adaptation, celebration, and tradition.”

Blackbird said she started the book with “all the truth and reconciliation pieces of Indigenous history. I felt by going through the seasons and the stages, starting it off with getting that acknowledgement and getting those pieces out there and then seeing how we grow through each season. Then it comes all the way towards spring and summer where there's regrowth and hope.”

Summer is abundance, she adds, when people travel and come together. 

Bringing that message of hope is especially important for Blackbird who works with youth. She notes that schools often “burden” youth with history while disregarding the “vibrant, inspirational” Indigenous role models that are prevalent on social media.

“You see this thriving Indigenous community, regardless of what Nation people come from. It's so very cool. And that's not shared enough in the wider public, I feel,” she said. “My goal with the book is to share what is really happening with Indigenous communities, that people are coming together, that they're strong and vital and there's so much cultural pride and connection with each other.” 

Lightning in Our Roots contains poems Blackbird wrote over a two- or three-year period during a time she was “able to engage in a new way with my own Indigenous identity” and work with knowledge keepers, Elders and Indigenous colleagues.

“That really helped me grow as an Indigenous person, but it also really helped with my writing, having a better understanding of who I am,” she said.

Just prior to this, Blackbird had received her Indian status card. At the same time, her extended family was also applying for status “and processing what that meant for us because it's a very strange thing…Having the government recognition of you as an Indian is a very bizarre thing. It's bittersweet.”

The hard work and tenacity of one of Blackbird’s mother’s cousins helped three generations of the family with the legal process of registration and also led to the fourth generation coming together to find their identity.

“With so many factors against Indigenous people learning their own stories, I find it beautiful that one person can accomplish so much for so many. I hope there are others going through this right now that persevere as the work is so important,” she said.

“As far as all of our family felt, (status) didn't make us Indigenous so having that validation was a weird thing because we didn't need it. But also it's hard to navigate the world in some spaces without going through the legal process.” 

Part of her processing, says Blackbird, came in writing Lightning in Our Roots.

The poem Unwritten is Blackbird’s response to her family coming back to their roots: “Run and hide to the city/Far fly like crows/A crow does not become something else when it leaves the tree/A crow is always a crow/The young will return.”

Blackbird is also an artist and photographer.

“When I'm inspired by something that I see, I will write about it. When I'm writing about something, sometimes I'll paint it. But certainly I feel like the arts are fluid that way. And just creativity and embracing art has been so freeing for me,” she said. “I just love to be able to express myself.”

Lightning in Our Roots, published Brick Books, will be released Oct. 27. It can be ordered at https://www.brickbooks.ca/shop/lightning-in-our-roots-by-avis-blackbird/