We Do Not Know Her Name

I do not know her name, but without her,
we do not have a name. No name, no face,

no place with your people, my people. You
have forgotten us, the tawny ones like my great-

grandmother, like Chief Osceola's Morning Dew,
the drops of your blood mixed with ours,

how you fought for her honor & ours,
because we were wronged, together. My hero,

your Osceola, loved his Morning Dew,
got his wife's brothers – my ancestors

& yours – to soak the Florida soil, the Georgia clay,
with a richer red. Her seeds, your seeds, legion.

Don't remember that now? How we wandered
with you along rivers now reduced to a trail,

made new homes in Okeechobee swamps, Oklahoma
& Mexico deserts. Learned Cherokee, French & Spanish.

Contigo. History's dead now. My grandfather's mother –
she's dead, too. No name, no face, no place

with my people: you. Only a figment
of her daughter-in-law's fading memory now,

the glaucoma & Alzheimer's clouding visions
of hair that crowned breasts & hips like a halo.

You have forgotten us. You have voted
us away from the land our blood bought.

We don't remember that now,
either. We do not know our names.