Warrior Cry: Peterborough's first poet laureate Sarah Lewis performs an ode to Indigenous warriors

For our latest iteration, we bring together four Indigenous female poets to speak their truth in the sixth edition of the CBC Arts series Poetic License. Watch previous performances now and read Sarah Lewis's poem below.

In this Poetic License instalment, meet spoken word artist Sarah Lewis. Hailing from Curve Lake First Nation, the Ojibwe/Cree poet was recently appointed as the first poet laureate of Nogojiwanong-Peterborough.

Not one to take this appointment lightly, Lewis knows her presence and voice is a form of resistance, saying: "My existence is a form of activism because we weren't supposed to be here."

Watch Sarah Lewis perform Warrior Cry in the video above — a piece Lewis describes as being written from the perspective of a dangerously empowered Indigenous woman. Filmed by myself and March Mercanti, it's an ode to the Indigenous warriors who fight daily for their communities, but also a reminder of the work that still needs to be done.

Warrior Cry

I am the warrior cry
that penetrates, slings, swings through your House of Commons window
not uncommon in my bloodline though
I'm the high priestess, and the empress 
Grabbing glass ceilings on my way down 

Turned into a floor
Turned to powwow grounds

I dance and stomp on top of shreds of the 1763 Royal Proclamation buried beneath my feet 

Jingle dresses and fancy shawls sweep the red crusted floor
I crow hop, stop and point to every door evicted of opportunity, every timeline
every generation eradicated
Here is where I stop and pray, 
I see my own fractured lineage, covered up with a band-aid branded: reconciliation

My moccasins reveal the mess you made crammed onto reservations

Crucifixes and crying eyes disguised and covered up as a friendly thanksgiving dinner get together 

A dinner reservation we did not make, had no choice in the matter of
Painted as a special seat by the door
And told to leave before the main course

Leftovers presented on a gold plated platter
and advertised as the special

Starved of culture, freedom, love, life our children, our world 
A diet built for a prisoner 
How special 

But my ancestors unshackle us daily, have prayed for us for millennia 

I am your Notre-Dame turned to flames
The firestarter that won't get out of the house that shamed her
A ceremonial smoke medicine flavour
Healing yet spicy 

A lyrical physicist, transcending truths through time and spaces that I now take up 

A felony if you dare touch me
Burnt hands will remind you that my blood still boils 

And land acknowledgements aren't going to fix that 

Because acknowledgements without change
Is like sorry without action 

Assaulting the land and bodies of water is an attack on Indigenous women's bodies and communities
This is forced entry to our life givers 

Indigenous women nurture our future
Feed our babies with ceremony

Babies that grow because of places like Pigeon lake 

The same place where Cottagers protest our wild rice/monoo-min for being too thick along the shores for their water skis to get through, of course

The irony of their anger, having something taken away 
As though their water sports trump our livelihood and survival 

You scream bloody murder and I scream privilege 

Tired of being labelled radical because I want clean drinking water for our communities, for Indigenous women and men to be alive, to thrive, yet we're devalued by the blue lives that promise us safety
Tired of being punished because of pigment But I digress 

Indigenous women, the backbone of the body we've abused, holding us together in this rusted gated concrete fused skeleton
They always call me back to my purpose
My power 
my body that's been displaced, my home 

I forever owe debt to to my grandmothers, mothers, aunties, sisters and friends 
So this one's for you 
Miigwetch

Watch more Poetic License.