article

Listen to the Elders

Written by Franklin Cruz
Related Roundtable Play: Collaboration and Co-creation prompted by Franklin Cruz
Art Medium Tags Poetry / Writing
Franklin Cruz, wearing a bright floral embroidered tunic, gestures while speaking to a seated group.
Franklin Cruz, the prompter discussing biomimicry. (Photo credit: Jenny Nagashima)

Let us listen to the elders
Arapahoe, Cheyenne, Lakota, Kiowa, Pawnee, Ute
And the other 42 tribes that live in Colorado
Who remind us the planet is as much a relative as a resource
If you are in this room recognize this
Heal Colorado to win, win to heal Colorado

Operating as an ecology over an economy
Find out why abuelo embellishes about his ranchos
Where he found tia frijol y calabaza
Biodiversification means humanization
Don’t you know being in rooms with folks only like you
Is a metric of monocultures

Where are the songs for the seasons
I cannot hear any drums anymore
I dream of deafening songs from cranes
Sanctioned marched of tarantulas
Wandering wolves and stable farming
We can’t keep favoring two leggeds

Haven’t you been on tik tok
Kids got podcasts wandering swamps and plant foraging
Pronouns intros, Southern, East coast
And an un-inimitable Albuquerque accent
America panned the camera
Showing folks of all kind benefit outside
Generations of hunters, canoers and birders

Any good field ecologists observes
These youngins are acting different
They’ve been listening despite our bias
Purifying water, legislating and direct actioning
A spunk just like my Mexican grandparents

A person with short curly hair and glasses gestures while speaking. Participants seated on either side listen attentively.
A roundtable participant speaks to attentive listeners. (Photo credit: Jenny Nagashima)

The elders remind us
Mitakoye oyasin
All my relations
The siblings that flow, layer and precipitate
Climbers, guides and conservationists
Educators with headwater knowledge
A biodiverse ecosystem of mind, bodies and souls
Stewarding generations of two legged and four
Brother pike, sister corn, cousin pika
First nations practices cause we going back to them anyway apparently

There’s a lot of spiritual fine tuning left
Get into that mechanic shop heart you got
When you can’t recognize the tools anymore
Remember homo habilis hacked tools up too
Mycological hominids
Epigenetic spiritual advice
Keep the young ones close to Tonanztin
Mother of all sand dunes, rockies and prairies
Conserve the love soil cantos
Any native person knows mother’s worth everything

Why else do run backpacking trips
Prefer herds in green pastures over factories
Fish where the surfactants don’t touch
Camp beyond light and sound pollution
Litigate for legends our grandparents dreamed about
Ascending the prayers for acequias
Facing doubts of democracy and profit
Heal generations of broken promises
Listening to pebble, plant, pond, people stories
Nature doesn’t show everything to everyone
Scar stories cause is wise to learn
Discerning the times we cut in, extract or exploit
Our consumption, bills and responsibilities are man-made and ours

Give native and frontline people your money
Risking reputations and cold shoulders for justice
Redirecting boards, trusts and friends
Freeing waters who miss families in the south
A parade of ribbon skirts and drums return to the forests
Remember its for the sake of us all
Colorado the beautiful is our initiative

A group of people seated in folding chairs in a semicircle listens to a person with long wavy brown hair gesturing with their hand.
Participants engage in conversation about biomimicry, and using nature to model collaborative creative practices. (Photo credit: Jenny Nagashima)

Listen to the elders
Nature is home
Colorado means colorful
I wonder what name it had before
I wonder if we heal if we can remember
I wonder how many names it has had
The elders remind us we’re an ecosystem
I bet you they have the names
I wonder if we’ll heal enough
Just to remember
What the elders said

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