Poems of the Past and Future
“Three Steps Forward” "I walk into the storm, again." Not with thunder in my chest, but with silence stitched into my coat— a patchwork of names, slurs, and stares I never asked to wear. "Three steps forward." Hope in hand, spine straight. But the wind knows my name and spits it back in fragments— not Vincent, not child, not kin. Just “other.” Just “not from here.” "Three steps forward." A job denied, a voice dismissed, a law that forgets my face. I learn to smile with my teeth clenched, to nod when I want to scream, to bury the ache so deep it grows roots in my bones. "Three steps forward." I build, I teach, I rise. But the storm circles back— a policy, a headline, a silence that says: “You do not belong.” "So I dig." Not for justice, but for a place to hide the grief. A quiet grave beneath my ribs where memory sleeps and rage hums like a trapped bat waiting for dusk. "Still, I walk." Not because the storm has passed, but because I refuse to be erased. My steps may falter, but they are mine. And somewhere beyond this storm, there is light that remembers my name.
“We Carry the Island” (For recognition, healing, and legacy) We came with hands worn raw from stone, Our names unspoken, our stories unknown. They called us shadows, kept us apart, But we held the island close to heart. No payslips marked the work we gave, No pension lines, no rightful grave. Yet in the silence, we still stood tall, Our language, laughter, love—our all. Chorus We carry the island in our bones, In every crab shell, every stone. We teach our children how to rise, To dance beneath unyielding skies. We are the islanders, proud and free— No shame can steal our history. They built their walls with words of race, But we made gardens in that place. We cooked, we prayed, we sang, we grew, And passed the strength our elders knew. Bridge Now we rebuild with open hands, No longer ghosts upon these lands. We share our stories, plant our seeds, And teach our children what love needs. We carry the island in our bones, In every crab shell, every stone. We teach our children how to rise, To dance beneath unyielding skies. We are the islanders, proud and free— No shame can steal our history. So let them see us, let them hear, The voices silenced all those years. We are Christmas Islanders still— With hearts unbroken, iron will.
“We Grew With the Island” We didn’t visit the island— we were the island. Our feet knew the coral paths before shoes ever did. We chased red crabs like cousins, dodged robber claws with laughter, and watched bats stretch dusk into stories. We fished with hands, not hooks, dived where the reef whispered secrets, and camped in forests that held our names in leaf and bark. No tent could hold our joy— we slept beneath stars that knew our faces. We didn’t learn culture— we lived it. It was the crackle of crab shells, the glide of fins, the hush of wings above our heads. It was the firelight on elder cheeks, the echo of songs that never needed microphones. Now they ask us to explain it— to write it down, to fit it in forms and frameworks. But we were young when the island taught us how to belong without asking permission. We are still that island, even far from its shore. We carry its rhythm, its salt, its silence, in every step we take toward memory.
“We Were the Islander” We were the islanders, before the maps were drawn, Before the laws came down like nets at dawn. We walked with crabs, not over them— Our hands knew reef, our hearts knew stem. We were the islanders, not guests in our own skin, But kin to coral, wind, and tin. They came with clipboards, rules, and shame, And told us we could not eat what bore our name. We were the islanders, like Gazarians in the dust, Our homes uprooted, our elders hushed. They fenced our memory, paved our pride, And called it policy while we cried. We were the islanders, not multicultural spice, But blood and bone, not once but twice. We married across lines they drew in fear, And built a culture they refused to hear. We are the islanders, still breathing through the pain, Still teaching children how to name The crabs, the bats, the songs, the sea— The things they tried to take from me. We are the islanders, and we will not forget, The taste of justice, not served yet. We rise like tides, like crabs in flight, With memory sharp and hearts alight.
“The Banner and the Bruise” They hung the word like bunting— Multiculturalism. Bright flags in school halls, slogans on buses, a handshake between strangers while the ground beneath cracked. They said: “Look how many colors we are.” But they never asked who gets to mix the paint, who gets to name the palette, who gets erased when the mural is done. We walked in, offered our food, our songs, our grief— and they took the food, played the songs, but left the grief at the door. They called it celebration. We called it survival. Because beneath the banner, the bruise still blooms: policies that punish our names, laws that forget our languages, streets that stop us for walking wrong. Multiculturalism, they said, is the answer. But they never asked the question. So we stand, not for the banner, but for the bruise— the truth that healing needs more than a festival. It needs justice. It needs memory. It needs us.
“We Were Not Meant to Stay” We were not meant to stay, said the contracts, the quotas, the ships. We were meant to mine, to bend, to break— to vanish when the phosphate ran dry. But we stayed. We built altars from rusted tin, sang prayers in borrowed tongues, buried our dead beneath ironwood shade and marked the soil with stories. We were not meant to remember, said the census, the silence, the maps. We were meant to forget our names, to fold into categories that never fit. But we remembered. We carved our festivals into the calendar, fed ghosts with rice and fire, taught our children the shape of the island by tracing it on their palms. We were not meant to belong, said the borders, the ballots, the grants. We were meant to be migrants, forever arriving, never arrived. But we belonged. We are the ones who stayed, who remembered, who belonged in a place that tried to unmake us. We are quasi-Indigenous— not by blood, but by bone, not by law, but by land, not by permission, but by presence. And still, we stay.