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https://dailyyonder.com/blood-memory/2010/07/16/

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[imgcontainer] [img:zibiwingexhibit530.jpg] [source]Mary Annette Pember[/source] The display at the entry to the "Telling Our Story" exhibit, at the Ziibiwing Center, shows Ojibwe ancestors carving the nearby Sanilac petroglyphs some 1,000 years ago. [/imgcontainer]

"Blood memory is described as our ancestral (genetic) connection to our language, songs, spirituality, and teachings. It is the good feeling that we experience when we are near these things."

So the Ziibiwing Center, on the Saginaw Chippewa Reservation in central Michigan, interprets the 7th Prophecy or Fire of the Anishinabek nation. The prophecy predicts that the Anishinabek people will rekindle their old ways and be reborn.

And for the present... "Blood memory has been crucial to the survival of our culture."
The Ziibiwing "Place by the River" Center stirred my 'Shinnob' blood big time. Although my Anishinabemowin language skills are pretty limited (in my family, we kids all thought, "Gaween" meant, "Behave!" It actually means "no."), I continue to marvel at the effect the language has upon me. It gives form to something I know yet don't fully understand. This knowledge or memory from the blood is the elemental aspect of being Anishinabe. In hearing it, I am pleased and fed in a way that goes deep into my bones.

[imgcontainer right] [img:ziibiwingcenterfront320.jpg] [source]Mary Annette Pember[/source] Outside the Ziibiwing Center, "a place by the river" in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, home of the Saginaw Chippewa. [/imgcontainer]

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Shaped like a crescent moon, the 32, 000 square foot building houses an array of exhibits showcasing the history and culture of the Saginaw Chippewa tribe and other Great Lakes Anishinabek tribes. Built in 2004, the $10 million museum includes permanent and changing exhibits, a research center, meeting and conference facilities, a gift shop, administrative offices and the tribe's center for historic preservation. This last office maintains the Saginaw Chippewa's historic and cultural resources and handles all issues that bear on the Native American Graves and Protection Act (NAGPRA), including disposition and reburial. Ziibiwing Center serves as the cultural hub of the community, offering classes in traditional Ojibwe crafts and language as well as a place for folks to come together for ceremony and gatherings.

Immersive and experiential, Ziibiwing presents Anishinabek history and culture in a uniquely Anishinabek format. I enter the permanent Diba Jimooyung "Telling Our Story" exhibit, walking into what appears to be one of our traditional teaching lodges. Beautiful images modeled after our sacred "spirit writings" are projected on the walls of the darkened lodge as I make my way through the exhibit. Our spiritual leaders recorded ceremonies and important events on birch bark scrolls centuries ago in a mnenonic script called "spirit writing."

The story of the Anishanabek people is told through our 7 prophecies or fires and illustrated with these spirit writings. The prophecies recount essential spiritual and life lessons as well as the history of our people.

In brief, according to Diba Jimooyung the prophecies tell us that more than 10,000 years ago, the Anishinabek people lived on the East coast of North America. At this time they were instructed to move west for their survival. They were told by a prophet to embark on a Great Walk, following the setting sun to a new home where the food grows on the water (manomin or wild rice). The megis (cowrie) shell appeared at seven places on the Walk showing the Anishinabek where to live. The Anishinabe or Chippewa or Ojibwe/Ojibway of the Great Lakes region are descended from these people.

[imgcontainer] [img:ziibiwingturtle530.jpg] [source]Mary Annette Pember[/source] Detail from a display of "spirit writing" used to tell the Ojibwe migration story. [/imgcontainer]

The prophecies tell of the coming of light skinned people who bring promises of joy and salvation, many of which are false. Some Anishinabek accept the promises and abandon the old ways, discouraging their children from listening to their elders, speaking the language or learning traditions. Finally the 7th prophecy describes a new people who rise up and rekindle the old ways. Anishinabek must then choose between two paths: desecration or compassion.

Walking through the exhibit, I experience something akin to participating in our ceremonies; I allow the language to wash over me, surrendering to its power. I marvel, as I often do, at the sophistication and nuance of our traditional life lessons that still resonate today in their understanding of the capricious nature of human beings. Our traditional teaching methods that integrate writing, visuals and demonstration, could be a contemporary model for engaging all types of learners.

Finally, I wonder why non-Indians think they have to go all the way out to the western U. S. to experience real Indians. We're right here in your own backyard.

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imgcontainer] [img:zibiwingexhibit530.jpg] [source]Mary Annette Pember[/source] The display at the entry to the "Telling Our Story" exhibit, at the Ziibiwing Center, shows Ojibwe ancestors carving the nearby Sanilac petroglyphs some 1,000 years ago. [/imgcontainer] "Blood memory is described as our ancestral (genetic) connection to our language, songs, spirituality, and teachings.

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If They Come For Us, a poem by Fatimah Asghar | Document Journal

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Wake up, greet the sun, and pray.

Burn cedar, sweet grass, sage-

sacred herbs to honor the lives we've been given,

for we have been gifted these ways since the beginning of time.

Remember, when you step into the arena of your life,

think about those who stand beside you, next to, and with you.

Your ancestors are always in your corner, along with your people.

When we enter this world we are born hungry,

our spirits long for us to live out our traditions

that have been passed down for generations.

Prayer, ceremony, dance, language-our ways of being.

Never forget you were put on this earth for a reason-

Be a good relative.

Illustration by Colin Laurel

Source: Poetry (March 2021)

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Being by Tanaya Winder | Poetry Magazine

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Wake up, greet the sun, and pray. Burn cedar, sweet grass, sage- sacred herbs to honor the lives we've been given, for we have been gifted these ways since the beginning of time. Remember, when you step into the arena of your life, think about those who stand beside you, next to, and with you.

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Japanese Breakfast - The Woman that Loves You [Official Single]

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and what my mother meant by
Don't stray was that she knew
all about it-the way it feels to need

someone to love you, someone not
your kind, someone white,
some one some many who live

of clouds? If not spilled milk? Or blood? in the millions? America is
If not the place we once were
Maps -

my country's plow. Yes,
when my mother said,
They don't love you like I love you,

*The italicized words, with the exception of the final stanza, come from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs song "Maps."

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They Don't Love You Like I Love You - My mother said this to me

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She says, Your English is great! How long have you been in our country?
I say, Suck on a mango, bitch, since that's all you think I eat anyway. Mangoes

are what margins like me know everything about, right? Doesn't
a mango just win spelling bees and kiss white boys? Isn't a mango

a placeholder in a poem folded with burkas? But this one,
the one I'm going to slice and serve down her throat, is a mango

that remembers jungles jagged with insects, the river's darker thirst.
This mango was cut down by a scythe that beheads soldiers, mango

that taunts and suns itself into a hard-palmed fist only a few months
per year, fattens while blood stains green ponds. Why use a mango

to beat her perplexed? Why not a coconut? Because this "exotic" fruit
won't be cracked open to reveal whiteness to you. This mango

isn't alien just because of its gold-green bloodline. I know
I'm worth waiting for. I want to be kneaded for ripeness. Mango:

my own sunset-skinned heart waiting to be held and peeled, mango
I suck open with teeth. Tappai! This is the only way to eat a mango.

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Self-Portrait as Mango by Tarfia Faizullah

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She says, Your English is great! How long have you been in our country? / I say, Suck on a mango, bitch, since that's all you think I eat anyway. Mangoes / are what margins like me know everything about, right? Doesn't