Ode to the Indigenous...

The beauty of ambiguity.

I'm not quite whatever you think I am when you first see me.

And this conversation has become a competition.

A race for who is more deserving of public pity.

But I'm tired.

I'm tired of being told what I am

Who I am

What belongs to me

How many people should or shouldn't feel badly for me because of my outside.

I Am Indigenous.

I repeat: I Am Indigenous.

And my status, my connection to my homeland and the land of my people doesn't change.

It doesn't change because of your invented narrative.

Or because it's currently convenient to preach tolerance while marginalizing, dehumanizing, and delegitimizing me.

Or because you would accept the status of ANY. Other. Minority. Without question.

First person historical account- Dayeinu. Archeology- Dayeinu.
DNA- Dayeinu.
Language- Dayeinu.
Currency, Dayeinu...
Kingdoms, dayeinu...
LEGALITY- DAYEINU!

But your hatred and bigotry force you into a life of cognitive dissonance.

Where everyone BUT...
has sovereignty.

Where everyone BUT...
is to be accepted as they are, for who they truly are.

But we WE must fit YOUR confines.

Follow YOUR rules.

How we look, how we speak, how we function.

Who we support, how we vote.

Even though

You put us in this position in the first place.

You took from us our home and threw us all over the world.

It is because of you that we are now wanderers- separate from our homeland.

But...

I am indigenous.

And you should take responsibility.


Because my homeland belongs to me.

And I know who I am.

I know what I am

And I'm tired.

Of being told that our story isn't enough.

We are enough

We are Jews.