I wrote this during Irei no Hi – Okinawa Independence Day – in June 2019.

The last line of this poem is a common phrase in Uchinaaguchi – the native indigenous language of the Ryukyu Kingdom, which is today known as the Okinawan Prefecture of Japan.

See Ailing Cheng’s photo, taken that same day, which contextualizes part of the on-going struggle of marginalized voices and oppressors’ silencing.