A design for Canada Day 2021 commemorates the Indigenous children whose bodies have recently been found near residential schools. (Illustration by Samantha Brijbassi for Vacay.ca)
Canada Day 2021(5)
We are Canada Stuck,
Those of us whose tears are not enough,
Castaways moulting out of patriot’s fluff,
Itching in a red-and-white coat we forever have wrapped, cozy and snug
Reconciliation begins thus,
In the process of the processing of the horror,
‘What do I now do?’ echoes til we holler,
Or swallow Ozick’s shawl,
each of its threads the texture
Of one of those shattered little bones that has bothered us all
‘Who are we? Who am I?’
If we don’t reckon with the reckoning of what has,
What is,
What now,
Canada Stuck, in a country so big,
Feeling small is the way to hold on,
For before its rise, a tribe first must crawl
