A Collision of Colonization

An excerpt from a poem by Joy Harjo to mark the shared colonial legacy of native Americans and Indians. Conceived and performed by Harjo and Ratnam in association with the United States Information Service as a transcultural project in August, 1997 at Chennai (Madras).

We were thinking about each other.
I was making a song to fit between a heron and the waving grass.
You were engraving rhythm with your feet beneath the banyan tree who was teaching you how to dance by standing still.
We were countries away, oceans, elephants, sea monster, deer and stars away.
I was thinking of you. You were thinking of me.
I was thinking of you. You were thinking of me.
We had no names for each other. You were a land I could not imagine though I had poetry and turtle shells.
I was a land that could be possible if you pondered the immensity of infinity when adding up the stars to keep track of destiny.
She was thinking of me.
And there he was.
The outcome of all her fears, a Europeans explorer who would set off to find India, turn the opposite direction to escape the edge of the world.
She tried to stop him. She turned her thoughts around, and they made a wide arc through the sky, became the rainbow lights shimmering above her heart.
But it was too late. He had already discovered the land of herons and waving grass.
And he would try to rule you, too.
And we were countries away, oceans, elephants, sea monster, deer and stars away.
And we were thinking of each other. Fire craves air. Air tastes rain.
Water is attracted to earth and earth cannot get through the day without sending flowers to the spirit of river.
We were thinking of each other then. We are thinking of each other now.