today I
rubbed my skin,
rubbed it almost purple and blue
but the stain of centuries abuse
hung around my neck like a knotted noose
this land was not made for you and me
stolen, bartered and reconstructed to deface
peoples, cultures and all that is divine and pure
this
this land was soiled with more than dark earth,
brown bodies and spilled worth
this land was rebirthed with a death
that continues to die
and reap the decay of moral culpability
for lives lost and change that dangles
precariously close to the edge of despair
