Kash Baloch — Poetry, Prose & Survival

When six men can simplify six hundred tribes, 

seemingly erasing their sacred spaces, 

then covering their resilient red skin 

with clown masks, and whitewashed faces, 

it becomes quite evident that 

their lives were deemed irrelevant. 

This particular element of European settlement 

was in fact, rather malevolent. 

This bedevilment became the brick and mortar 

building blocks that laid the foundation for the extermination 

of indigeneous ancestral traces, 

eliminating their authenticity, 

and history, in order to eradicate

 them from a stolen nation. 

A genocide created by gunpowder treason, 

an extinction over time that lacked humanity, 

let alone any logic or reason. 

From 18 million brave—

belittled and enslaved to pave 

the bloodsoaked reserves that exist today, 

with less than one-third of their original clique 

laughed away an⁹d left to 

decay on some heroic highway. 

Statistics this stark should send 

shockwaves across this stolen nation, 

but instead are met with a silence 

that's as stifling as strategic strangulation. 
It's suffocating.

AND my soul cries for the lost tribes 

of a lawless station, 

invaded by a species deluded by 

their imagination of having invented emancipation.  

And yet, they still refuse to acknowledge allegations about 

sisters, and mothers, 

otherwise known as their 

missing and murdered Indigenous relations.  

As though mass graves beneath 

Catholic enclaves were some kind of coronation, 

and I'm not saying anything 

aside from stating that 

this conversation is long overdue.  

It's about time we either flipped the script, 

and fixed this broken system, 

or changed their same old 

divide and conquer, fear-monger-

ing corporately-scripted station.

If a Marula tree falls in the woods, and no one is around; does it even make a sound?

What about when a warrior queen wails for the infant son who's been ripped right out of her shaking arms?

Does anybody hear it? Even if their tattoo tears concealed it, I know their eyes still had to see it.

Mother Africa wept silently through all those strife-filled years, her only solace lie in knowing that her stoic sun was near.

Blazing high up in the sky or beating against the scorching dirt, he wanted their invading feet to burn, just like their crackling whip that hurt.

As the neutral Earth tones blushed, imprinted by innocent blood, a permanent stain remained to ensure their names would not be washed away by monsoon rains.

Being sold out by neighbouring tribes hurt more than these pale faces whom they'd never seen before upon their shores. 

Was it even worth the reward of being the last prisoner whose head banged against the wooden floor?

Thrown into the stomach of a sardonic ghost ship, with the same siblings they had just helped the enemy enslave. 

Instantly swallowed alive by all the hateful eyes that questioned why they'd danced with these devils anyway.

And so it had begun, the beginning of humanity's end; when our brothers became animals to the very monsters who stopped seeing them as men.

Down here it was pitch dark and silent, just like the jungle, late at night; their vision struggled to make sense of whether they'd died or were somehow still alive.

The foul stench of rotten flesh filled the fetid air; whispered prayers shouted loudly for a creator who was neither here nor there.

As the rocking beast screeched to a sudden halt, sunlight peeked through cracks in its rotting walls. 

Perhaps their saviour had heard their cries after all? Maybe justice would be served and this evil would be stalled?

And so, these beautiful souls believed their torture was over and done.

My heart still aches to know their captors
were just starting to have their fun.

Shackled like chattel, and less worthless than cattle—they were poked and prodded by demons who believed they were far from godless heathens.

Wade in the water, children, we shall overcome, but not until we rise up against the poison in their souls.

Your acidic heart of insecurities could never break my spirit, it can only break my bones.

Just you wait and see what my maker has in store for me—you'll only know my agony when you're the one in chains, and I'm the one who's free.