Читать книгу undercurrent - Rita Wong - Страница 7

declaration of intent let the colonial borders be seen for the pretensions that they are i hereby honour what the flow of water teaches us the beauty of enough, the path of peace to be savoured before the extremes of drought and flood overwhelm the careless water is a sacred bond, embedded in our plump, moist cells in our breaths that transpire to return to the clouds that gave us life through rain in the rivers & aquifers that we & our neighbours drink in the oceans that our foremothers came from a watershed teaches not only humbleness but climate fluency the languages we need to interpret the sea’s rising voice water connects us to salmon & cedar, whales & workers its currents bearing the plastic from our fridges & closets a gyre of karma recirculates, burgeoning body burden i hereby invoke fluid wisdom to guide us through the toxic muck i will apprentice myself to creeks & tributaries, groundwater & glaciers listen for the salty pulse within, the blood that recognizes marine ancestry in its chemical composition & intuitive pull i will learn through immersion, flotation & transformation as water expands & contracts, i will fit myself to its ever-changing dimensions molecular & spectacular, water will return what we give it, be that arrogance & poison, reverence & light, ambivalence & respect let our societies be revived as watersheds

because i am part of the problem i can also become part of the solution

although i am part of the problem i can also become part of the solution

where i am part of the problem i need to be part of the solution

while i am part of the problem i can also be part of the solution

one part silt one part clear running water one part blood love sweat

not tar but tears, e inserts a listening, witnessing, quickening eye

broken but rebinding, token but reminding, vocal buck unwinding

the machine’s gears rust in rain, moss & lichen slowly creep life back

the rate of reclamation is humble while the rate of destruction blasts fast

because we are part of the problem we can also become part of the solution

Who are we? We are the beings who need clean water in order to live a life of dignity, joy and good relation. Maybe you are part of “us” without even knowing that you are. Maybe we are the ones who are too often taken for granted or ignored, the quiet witnesses to atrocities, greed, mean-spirited hierarchies, hostages of capitalism. Maybe we are remembering what it means to respect water, because doing so is to respect ourselves, our shared, fluid vulnerability, our funny contradictions, our stumbling, dancing, crying, laughing, eating, drinking, pissing, working, playing, burping, farting, messy selves. Maybe we are the thunderstorms that precipitate when too much has been repressed, the weeds that refuse to stop, the coyotes, the grandmothers, the yet unborn. Maybe we are flash floods, demoralized workers, the hospitalized, the angry entitled children who don’t even remember to thank the water that keeps them alive. Maybe we are system change as well as climate change. Dripping & spitting, we rise.