The second Monday in October is marked as Thanksgiving in Canada, and Columbus Day in many states in the United States of America. In recognition of the brutal, on-going history of colonization across Turtle Island, parishioner Len Desroches offers this poem.
by Len Desroches
Columbus, if only you had not been so afraid of discovery
Christopher, “Christ bearer,” if only you had discovered soul
discovered soul before rushing off
in gunboat for Spanish empire
stealing land
shedding rivers of blood
to mine shiny bits from Earth’s bleeding bowels
re-writing Gold with a capital “G”
made it easy to also leave out the “l”
Gold became God
Gold becomes God