Louise B. Halfe - Burning in This Midnight Dream

When I was asked to write the foreword to Cree poet Louise B. Halfe Sky Dancers fourth book of poetry, I accepted with some trepidation. How could I do justice to these poems that invoke such a powerful mix of feelings: anger, shame, despair, confusion, love, joy, and hope? With a deep sense of humility, I am honoured to write these few words. As author of Unsettling the Settler Within: Indian Residential Schools, Truth Telling, and Reconciliation in Canada, and through my work with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, I have reflected deeply on the incredibly rich and generous gift that Canadians have been given by those who survived the Indian residential school system. They have shared their life memories with each other and with all of us so that together we will learn, understand, and remember. They do so in the hope that we will take action to change things so that their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren will have better lives. This is the hard work and promise of reconciliation; it involves decolonizing ourselves, our families, our communities, our workplaces, and our country. It is everyones work.

Reconciliation has many pathways; writing poetry is one. Louises poems are teachings. She writes hard truths about what she and her parents suffered at the hands of the nuns and priests at residential school. She writes about secrets that haunt and silences kept, and about finding the strength to persevere. Sky Dancers poems are teachings. She writes about her nhkom and nimosm, her Cree grandparents, who knew the old ways the medicines, the pipe, the sweat lodge and enjoyed the wealth and dignity that came from living and working on their own land. Louise Sky Dancers writing is both a courageous act of resistance and a reclaiming of culture, language, and the blood memory of her ancestors that, despite the ravages of colonialism, is still written on her heart.

Her poems remind us that sometimes childhood memories comfort us as we recall our home, our family, our culture. These teach us about who we are and where we belong. We remember the places, sights, sounds, and smells of our childhood. We treasure those special times we shared with grandparents or parents as they lovingly taught us how to walk in the world. For many residential school surivivors, there are other memories too; of adults who abused them and spewed racial hatred that made them feel ashamed, confused, lonely and unloved. Memories of loss, disconnection and an unrelenting longing for the ties of family and community that have been damaged and may never be repaired. Memories of unsafe homes where the lessons of violence learned by great-grandparents, grandparents and parents in the residential schools were then inflicted on new generations of children. Survivors life stories hold all of these memories.

These poems are testimonies of truth, justice, and healing. These poems are gifts. I invite you, the reader, to read and reflect upon them with open minds and humble hearts. Then share them with others. They unsettle us in a good way. They inspire us. They give us hope.

Paulette Regan, 2016

Pete Waskewitch, Kakakon (Wilfred Chocans grandmother), and Charlie Waskewitch. Pete and Charlie are brothers.