Photo: Angela Lalond
Photo: Angela Lalond

by Roua Aljied

        My name’s Roua Aljied, I am an immigrant settler living on unceded, unsurrendered Algonquin territory. As a poet I perform under the name Philosi-fire, but today I’m just writing as Roua. I spent the last week trying to come up with a clever way of saying how I feel in a poem, but I just couldn’t be clever because I’m tired. I’m tired, and I’m afraid. And I’m even more tired of being told that my fear is not valid, or that we are not entitled to march because he’s already been elected, as if that’s ever stopped us before.

On November 8th I was scared, but not as afraid as I am today. Back then I was remembering that Black, Indigenous, and people of colour have overcome oppression at the hands of white supremacy for centuries, so we were going to survive this too. But now I’m realizing that not all of us did survive. Many Indigenous people did not survive when the colonizers first came to this land. Not all survived the residential school system. Not all survived the 60’s scoop. Many Africans did not survive when they were stolen from their own land. Not all survived the Jim Crow period. Not all survived the civil rights movement and like clockwork one of us won’t survive in another 28 hours. So who gets to survive the revolution? Is it the 53% of white women who voted for Trump, or the remaining who will promise you they didn’t but still be protected by their privilege.

I’m not marching because I want to see a new president because regardless of who’s in that position people who look like me are going to die, and that’s what people in positions of power and privilege never seem to understand. I’m standing here today because resistance is the only way to survive when your existence is constantly being attacked. Many of us immigrants or refugees would not even be here if home was safe enough to return to. We came here to survive, so why would we stop trying now. My parents will tell me about Sudan before the dictators came into power and years later they still want to return. I’m not sure they always realize the Sudan they remember isn’t the same as the one that exists today. I am afraid that in 20 years I will have to tell my own children that the world was never great, but because of what led to yesterday’s event the world they’re living in will be even unsafer than the one I was born into.

I’m not going to spend any time trying to convince his supporters that I am worthy of empathy, that I am human, or that I am like them. Because I am not like them. My heart is not full of hatred for people who have not done me wrong, so they can continue to rally, but we will march in greater numbers. They can attack, but we will continue to resist. Because my revolution started the moment I was born and I’m going to continue to do the one thing that America hates most. I will survive.

This article first appeared in the Leveller Vol. 9, No. 4 (January/February 2017).