Wansolwara Voices for West Papua

Wansolwara Voices for WEST PAPUA

Copyright © 2015 by the individual artists and writers of this collection Contact: www.hawaiireview.org hawaiireview@gmail.com Submit: bit.ly/submit2HR Cover Art: The cover art for this publication features beautiful block prints titled West Papua Merdeka! from visual artists Joy Enomoto & Bafinuc Ilai. The work at once imagines the women of West Papua being severed from their land and the land itself being desecrated through the Grasberg Mine. The work also invokes the strength and resistance of West Papuans.

The cover design was produced, generously, by Culture Shocka.

A Note on This Collection: Hawaiʻi Review is honored to publish this

collection of fierce poetry and visual art, from a hui based at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Featuring work from UHM students, faculty, and community members, this publication is produced in solidarity for a free and independent West Papua. We are grateful to the poets, song-writers, and visual artists featured in these digital pages. We hope this collection broadens your works’ reach.

—Hawai‘i Review, May 10, 2015

featuring Lee Kava & Tara Kabutaulaka Noʻu Revilla & Jamaica Osorio Brandy Nālani McDougall & Craig Santos Perez Lyz Soto & Bryan Kuwada Rajiv Mohabir Jocelyn Ng, Harrison Ines, Malia Derden, & Sarah Daniels Jonathan Kay Kamakawiwoʻole Osorio Ry Rarai Aku Jr Joy Enomoto & Bafinuc Ilai Luseane Raass Raymond Mulitalo Culture Shocka

University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa

CONTENTS

6

Introduction

POETRY + LYRICS 8

rorongo / fanongo mai Lee Kava & Tara Kabutaulaka

13

A Love Letter to West Papua Noʻu Revilla & Jamaica Osorio

15

Morning Star Brandy Nālani McDougall & Craig Santos Perez

18

Nine Percent Lyz Soto & Bryan Kuwada

21

Arlince Tabuni Rajiv Mohabir

22

Pacific Tongues for West Papua Jocelyn Ng, Harrison Ines, Malia Derden, & Sarah Daniels

26

One Salt Water Jonathan Kay Kamakawiwoʻole Osorio

27

Freedom for West Papua Ry Rarai Aku Jr

VISUAL ART + EPHEMERA

30 Joy Enomoto & Baffinue Ilai 32 Ry Rarai Aku Jr 34 Anonymous 35 Luseane Raass 36 Anonymous 37 Raymond Mulitalo 38 Culture Shocka BIOS

INTRODUCTION

The Grasberg mine in West Papua, owned by U.S. company FreeportMcMoRan, is the largest gold mine and third largest copper mine in the world. The profits of this mine depend upon U.S.-endorsed Indonesian military occupation, the murder, imprisonment, and forced labor of indigenous peoples, and the dumping of thousands of tons of toxic waste into local river systems.

Under the illegal occupation by the Indonesian government since 1969, over 500,000 West Papuan civilians have been killed in an attempt to suppress the West Papuan independence movement and protect corporate mining, logging, and palm oil interests. Foreign journalists and human rights workers have been banned from entering the country, creating a terrible silence around this genocide, and the “modern world” continues to blithely benefit from the bits of copper and gold essential to the constructing of our electronic devices and the building of our cities.

On April 21, 2015, a dynamic hui of performers came together at Hālau o Haumea (Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies), University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, for a night of art and performance for justice, stretching across our great and powerful Oceania. More than 60 supporters came out for education and for community-building around this issue, in concert with a larger hui of Pacific 6 | activists and artists in Honolulu, Wellington, Aotearoa/NZ, and Suva, Fiji, who are uniting across Oceania to lament and rage against this genocide, connecting our different communities’ struggles for sovereignty and demilitarization, standing with West Papua across our “wansolwara,” our one salt water, with furious aloha.

The event—sponsored by the Gladys Kamakakūokalani ʻAinoa Brandt Center for Hawaiian Studies, Pacific Tongues, UH Mānoa Creative Writing Program, and UH Mānoa Indigenous Politics—and the artist workshop that took place on March 11, were formed by many hands. In addition to the artists included in this publication, the following individuals offered crucial support/guidance/ participation in these events: Lia Maria Barcinas, Marissa Buendicho, Marion Cadora, Noe Goodyear-Kaʻopua, Mehanaokalā Hind, kuʻualoha hoʻomanawanui, D. Kealiʻi MacKenzie, Tagi Qolouvaki, Jennifer Wheeler, and Aiko Yamashiro.

The following collection of poetry, songs, visual art, and ephemera is a written record of this powerful evening. We hope that in entering this collection, more will be moved to education, to solidarity, to action.

We invite you to join us.

For more information: www.freewestpapua.org

www.oceaniainterrupted.com #wansolwara #webleedblackandred #freewestpapua

#papuamerdeka #hawaiibleedsblackandred

POETRY + LYRICS

rorongo / fanongo mai Lee Kava & Tara Kabutaulaka

(italics read by Lee, regular text read by Tarcisius, bold text read together) rorongo mai fanongo mai rorongo mai fanongo mai listen, listen listen! to stories fished from the depths stories chopped and chewed in the teeth of islands and the tongue of the sea

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to stories held between us strained through blood stories passed in bilo woven in bilum tapped in the rhythm of kudu we share kava as story as body as blood as memory as resistance— so when i give you kava i give you story i give you blood i give you memory— listen listen rorongo mai fanongo mai

There once was a couple with a daughter who was very sick One day, a high chief came the parents had no crops to offer— in desperation they sacrificed their daughter as food for the chief the chief, so moved his people would give so much, refused to eat the body of their daughter— instead he buried her with the honors of a chief from her head grew first kava plant from her body grew first sugar cane

kava ko e kilia mei Fā‘imata ko e tama ‘a Fevanga mo Fefafa fahifahi pe mama ha tāno‘a mōno anga ha pulu mōno tata ha pelu ki tau‘anga ha ‘eiki ke olovaha ha mu‘a ke ‘apa‘apa ke fai‘aki e holo taumafa1

to this day, kava is our story our body our blood our memory our resistance so when you receive kava when we give you story in the telling we give you body we give you ears listen rorongo mai / fanongo mai we are not just islands in a sea—we are a sea of islands we are not just Melanesia, Polynesia, Micronesia, we are sister, brother, auntie, uncle, ancestor and as connected Islanders we are stories of resistance

________________________________________________________________________ 1. This kava chant is quoted from Langi Tau‘olunga & Hiva Kakala (2000), compiled by Kik Velt. The Tongan chant is entitle “Ko e laulau e kilia ‘o e kava,” or “The chant of the kava.” The words that accompany the Tongan chant in this poem are a paraphrased version of the kava origin story from the same text.

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this story this bilo this kava is for the resistance in West Papua so listen carefully because when you hear “Act of Free Choice”— 26th province— Indonesian occupation— West Papuans are not agitators— they are not here for autonomy— West Papuans are not outnumbered— we do not hear 10 |

we say

it is violent intimidation military occupation genocide but freedom fighters but full independence because we stand with them in solidarity Irian Jaya

Papua Merdeka this is what we serve— when you receive kava we give you story in the telling we give you body we give you eyes bebere mai / sio mai look! because our stories make visible our Oceania where many only see empty space our stories give sight— see the Morning Star rise

our stories show West Papua when cameras newspapers media and governments refuse to give witness our stories weave relationship when border lines are drawn to sever the bodies of our connection in our stories we are not targets for practice ‘transmigration’ occupation genocide our stories reclaim sight even from the narrow focus of a gun because once upon a time we were the stories chopped and chewed in the teeth of islands and the tongue of the sea because once upon a time we were held together by the tide and stars because once upon a time our connection to one another was strained through blood and land today, we serve that memory as kava when i give you kava i give you story i give you blood i give you memory

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we remember there has always been blood in the kava bowl we bleed black and red we are connected, wansolwara! we watch we listen we tell we stand in story in solidarity— Papua Merdeka!

12 |

A Love Letter to West Papua Noʻu Revilla & Jamaica Osorio

I met you with your scars.

If I hold you close, will I hear machetes on your neck? Or drums?

How do I learn to love you when I know so little of your body?

None of your spine, terrain, lifelines or the black rapture of copper & steel closing in on itself.

What does highlands smoke smell like?

I reach for you knowing this tight lip promise this sworn silence ʻiwi melting into its own quiet The bird of paradise has been split in half Papua, half Papua.

Morning Star dawns You need a passport to breathe & I witness your body How do I resist loving you only in pieces we have in common—

1887 bayonets pointed at our king.

1893 soldiers pointed at our queen. acts of “free choice” I push past the language of solidarity— More than 21,000 makaʻāinana pointing back. and cover you in my arms.

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What if where you’ve been brokered & broken, I offer my hands to keep the pit from growing?

Will Indonesia stop holding hands over your mouth?

Will the nightmares stop?

If I kiss you where your bilum sits, will I taste your wing space perspire?

Our touching a ceremony of resistance This is a love letter to West Papua, to be in charge of loving itself

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Morning Star Brandy Nālani McDougall & Craig Santos Perez ~ kaikainaliʻi wakes from her late afternoon nap and reaches for nālani with small open hands— count how many papuan children still reach for their disappeared parents using my iphone, i change my facebook profile picture to a graphic of the morning star flag and share an article about the grasberg mine— gaping open pit count papuan children dying from copper poisoning each year kaikainaliʻi watches cartoons on our flat screen tv while nālani and i watch an online documentary about west papua— #forgottenbird ofparadise count how many papuan children have watched their loved ones mounted and shot after we turn off the tv and close the laptop— nālani reads to kaikainali’i a bedtime story “Twinkle, twinkle, small hōkū Shining down on our canoe Up above the sea so high, Like a candle in the sky”

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count how many papuan children have been extracted to islamic boarding schools in jakarta “When the ocean waves are black, When we feel like turning back, Hōkū shines its little light, Guiding us all through the night.” count papuan children seeking refuge across borders only to become forgotten refugees “Waves may fall or rise up high, Keep your eyes upon the sky, Hōkū peeks out in between, Shining out its steady beam.” count how many hashtags it will take to trend bleeding black island bodies strip 16 | mined by bullets crushed into slurry by military boots pumped through pipelines across poisoned rivers and treeless lands, shipped overseas and enslaved by our technology— “Thunderclouds may push and shove.

Rain may pour from up above.

Never fear, our star is strong, Burning bright the whole night long.” papuan cousins, we’re so sorry we didn’t see you— but we see you now— and imagine someday we can talk story chew betelnut, and color the soil

with our spit as our children paint their faces red and play in the quiet shelter of our sacred mountains— “Paddle one and paddle two, Following our brave hōkū, Like our fathers did before, We will make it to the shore.” papuan cousins we’re so sorry we didn’t see you, but we see you now bravely raising your flag so the world can witness the five-point star on the horizon— and we promise to rise with you until morning finally comes to heal our open wounds #papuamerdeka “Twinkle, twinkle, small hōkū, Shining down on our canoe, Up above the sea so high, Like a candle in the sky.”

“Twinkle, twinkle, small hōkū, Shining down on our canoe.”

_______ *Quoted text by Jane Gillespie, from Twinkle, Twinkle Small Hōkū (BeachHouse Publishing, 2013).

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Nine Percent Lyz Soto & Bryan Kuwada

In 2013, the American mining company Freeport McMoRan made 4,346,000,000 dollars from the Grasberg mine in West Papua, which produced 885 million pounds of copper and 1.1 million ounces of gold for the 299 million computers, 179 million tablets, and 284 million smart phones that we bought that year.

When I leave my house I put the morning star to my back I search for statistics in her struggling rise Spine bent like Mauʻumae Ridge, there above Leaning down to work in Venus’s light A 50 year occupation At Kahikina arrives a new dawn An American “compromise” but I cast my eyes to the west West Papua we make songs with your gold on our fingers 18 | towards Komohana, the entrance to death and completion counting one hundred thousand two hundred thousand Hōkūloa comes from the east three hundred thousand but its eyes too look to the west four hundred thousand where the sun enters the sea five hundred thousand dying in the blue that connects us West Papua, we see you in the setting sun the light gives way to pō, to black the death of light, that is life when we turn to cell phones, tablets, computers, and televisions to cast our eyes in a copper hue In the dark of pō I cast my eyes to the west

and see another morning star

another Hōkūloa another Hokualiʻi another Mūlehu casting light on backs bent to the ground black backs humped like green hills outlined in light

We cast our eyes across mountains falling to rivers spilt with tailings and blood tapping out poems across a keyboard my humped spine arched to tethered limbs typing through 12 billion lbs of copper 1 and a half million lbs of gold

beneath a hundred billion US dollars

We are blind.

But the morning star rises again while we measure for measure balance the value and the cost of human life still obstructed by black of night justify price with convenience obstructed by black in the mines at $1.50 and a death every hour obstructed by black in the ledger drawing out cartographic tracks of our progress obstructed by black on the map constructed by the toll of our lives obstructed by they are black and their lives are cheap constructed by a history in dust in clay in hands molding to teach us —progress gorges itself sick. We must ravish others to husks and call ourselves human—them monsters gashed and wounded with malachite welts cuprite sores bones extracted from their bodies at one thousand three hundred twelve dollars an ounce their wails

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rhythmic with loss and rushing circles of defiance

are not ours. We remain deaf to those drum muscles beating in half a century of US sanctioned silence.

During the 50 year occupation of West Papua, roughly 500,000 Papuans have died at the hands of the military backed by the Indonesian government, the United Nations, and the Freeport McMoRan and Rio Tinto corporations.

That’s 500,000 dead in 50 years.

That’s 10,000 deaths per year.

That’s 27.39 deaths per day.

That’s 1.14 deaths per hour.

9% of a person died while you listened to this poem 20 | What is the price of a Papuan life?

Arlince Tabuni Rajiv Mohabir

Close the mouth and eyes of her corpse.

Light a lamp to burn three days, one day for each bullet. To prepare her body for cremation tie her in a yellow sari. Adorn the deathbed with jasmines, with roses, with marigolds.

Carry Arlince Tabuni on a palanquin, on your shoulders, into the cremation grounds, into America: an eleven-year-old gunned down by Indonesians with Australian ammunition for guns hunting Organisasi Papua Merdeka, to squash separatist insurrection triggered by what the papers call “excess frustration and panic� for the rights to the womb bearing rare minerals in the ground, for America, for the freedom to fact check this on your PDA. Withdraw the three bullets from her chest and her throat, to fold back the skin from its grizzly blossom of gore, sew into wholeness. Place on her forehead a tikkah of sacred ash and sandalwood paste, blessed by the Lord of Death. Drop drops of the river Ganga in her mouth. If you are not by the Ganga use free drops of the sea, unowned, unmastered by Empire so that the soul like the surf may obtain moksh. liberation, Merdeka for all of West Papua.

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Pacific Tongues for West Papua Jocelyn Ng, Harrison Ines, Malia Derden, & Sarah Daniels

They came to the pacific to make money they make money by raping the land to rape the land they kill the people To kill a person you need a gun In high school no one told me about West Papua no one bothered to say recruiters are always at war.

Trained to target the weak.

Trained to target the brown.

Have you ever noticed the amount of recruiters in a poor neighborhoods high school?

Can you imagine?

A brown military.

A loaded gun.

A pawn in a game of chess. our teachers hid your fight under our desks 22 | our government hustles your death into our taxes, the genocide and oppression is spilling out of our blind side I wonder who my tax dollars shot today. what was their story? how do they speak?

Are there waves that have touched both of our shores.

There are 36 warheads in our harbor the military is so heavy on our skin Gun smoke breathing down our necks.

Gun smoke breathing down our necks.

Gun smoke breathing down our necks.

Gun. Smoke.

Breathe.

Gun. Smoke.

Breathe.

Gun. Smoke.

(Breathe) The recruiters are so close in this game of chess

The recruiters are so close in this game of chess The recruiters are so close in this game of chess Step one: Send the pawns.

Armed to protect the king and queen.

Loaded gun.

Step two: Let them fight.

There is a reason the king and queen stay in the back.

There is a reason the government send their sons to attack Step three: Condition pawns to believe that corruption is our truth Do not explain it They never taught me this in history class anyway They. never. taught. them this. in history class any-way I have been watching the bloodshed for so long, it has begun to paint my eyes.

Disassemble sight.

Disassemble the eyes from outside spin the world away disassemble sight. erase the oceans from every map Disassemble sight. dam the tide of the West Papuan voice Disassemble sight.. blindfold Human Rights with gold trade in 20/20 vision for 20 dollar bills Polish clean.

Now paint your eyes in bloodshed Polish clean.

Billion dollar companies pay for privilege Indonesian guns Polish Clean Drag money through the mud of illegal mines Polish Clean.

Soldier wipes Native blood from hands Polish clean.

Soldier tell them it is normal for their children to---Polish clean.

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Tell me ocean, what happens to our mother when her children feed on her womb?

Are we still a sea of islands?

--Polish clean. or are we just islands in the sea? we are measurable and thus lonely. put on the scope Watch boulder break. load mother earth mined for her heart lock. heart into the chamber of a missle safety off Watch missile placed into hands of brown body Watch brother shoot brother Watch brown bodies break like boulders Reload. Repeat watch sons shot into soil brown bodies replace dirt mother earth giving birth in reverse six feet into her womb 24 | The influence of the white Cross contamination The collision of oil and salt water We are the plague the cure.

Dear world, If I could hold your wounds in my hands, without having it leak What do I tell you I did with all of this distance?

Dear world, I watch old men lead their sons to fight for the greed nestled in their chests.

I watch villages burn, ravaged, turned into twigs and ash lately ive been walking away. i try to donate you to the past. of copper slicked scream. of how i hold a fragment of the mine in my phone. of the bullet smelting a villages cry & plea & heat

& lead of turning you into a natural resource of a rifle painting smoke into warnings of a technician painting gold & copper into circuit boards the big name companies try to erase our vastness from their maps they will fill your mouth with the scales of all the fish they gut, they will spill our tears in your lap they will pile all the empty bullet shells on your back what is it like to be a secret keeper?

To have the military force innocent blood into your clenched fists and ask the victim to apologize What will we do then?

How do we fight back when every dawning voice gets turned into dusk? how much stomach does it take to join the revolution? what is time but what we remember? what is distance but what are afraid to touch?

Dear world, we are here today in the Pacific to make a difference We make a difference by giving voice to the silenced to give voice we wrote this poem to write this poem we first learned how to listen.

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One Salt Water Jonathan Kay KamakawiwoĘťole Osorio

Once I had a memory that was long Once I had a garden now itĘťs gone Wansolwara I believe your song Wansolwara Once I caught my fish within this net Once I knew what I should not forget Wansolwara you will lead us yet Wansolwara Hui Wansolwara, Our children will return their lives to thee Thou gracious sea Wansolwara 26 | Once I saw the morning star at dawn Once I saw their armies sailing home West Papua you are not alone Wansolwara

Freedom for West Papua Ry Rarai Aku Jr

I hear it on the radio I read it in newspapers I watch it on TV It’s all over the Internet West Papuans Mothers and daughters Raped and humiliated Fathers and sons Tortured and killed Villages destroyed Homes burned to the ground Families constantly on the run All for what?

For their land Their gold Money and Wealth Their Freedom, their lives, And rights

Sanap stron West Papua Mama Graun em bun blo yumi Sanap stron brata na susa blo mi Freedom em right blo yumi!

If I said I felt their pain I knew what they were going through I’d be lying to you I’d be lying me I can only imagine What runs through a mother’s Terrified, exhausted head Lying in fear and Drowning in her tears Because she watched the fruit of her womb slashed to death

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A father left wondering How do I protect my family?

How do I provide for them?

Where do we go from here?

I will understand if you’re tired Father—You’re human too.

Ol brata na susa blo mi Lo West Papua We eat of the same fruits We breath the same air We walk the same land We share the waters That surround us You look like me and I look like you And yet I struggle to Fully grasp all that you go through I’ll rise up with you I’ll hold your hand and I’ll walk with you I’ll fight along side you 28 | And on the highest mountain I’ll raise your flag with you I’ll stand strong and make sure They all hear me Freedom for West Papua!

VISUAL ART + EPHEMERA | 29

30 |

West Papua Merdeka! by Joy Enomoto & Baffinue Ilai

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32 |

by Ry Rarai Aku Jr

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34 |

by Anonymous

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by Luseane Raass

36 |

by Anonymous

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by Raymond Mulitalo

Wansolwara Voices for West Papua Art by Baffinuc Ilai & Joy Lehuanani Enomoto

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Tuesday, April 21, 2015 5:30pm 8:30pm Hālau o Haumea Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies

#PapuaMerdeka #WeBleedBlackAndRed #FreeWestPapua

Ephemera by Culture Shocka

Art and Performance in Furious Aloha for a Free and Independent West Papua

For More Information HawaiiBleedsBlackAndRed @gmail.com

Sponsored by the UH Mānoa Creative Writing Program and the Gladys Kamakakūokalani ‘Ainoa Brandt Chair

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BIOS

Ry Rarai Aku Jr is from Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, and attended Hawaiʻi Pacific University, where she earned a BA in political science. Her experiences growing up in Papua New Guinea motivate her research interest in women’s roles in society. Rarai is interested in exploring gender equality in the Pacific Islands and hopes to develop culturally sensitive and respectful ways to address the issues.

Joy Enomoto and Bafinuc Ilai are visual artists from Hawaiʻi and Papua Niugini who came together to create a collaborative work in support of the Hawaiʻi Bleeds Black and Red campaign to free West Papua. The work West Papua Merdeka! at once imagines the women of West Papua being severed from their land and the land itself being desecrated through the Grasberg Mine. The work also invokes the strength and resistance of West Papuans.

Tarcisius (Tara) Kabutaulaka is a scholar and teacher who has worked in universities, as well as with governments, intergovernmental organizations, and communities in the Pacific Islands. He comes from the Weather Coast of Guadalcanal in Solomon Islands, and was educated in Solomon Islands, Fiji, and 40 | Australia. In January 2009, he joined the Center for Pacific Island Studies as an associate professor. Before moving to Hawaiʻi he taught history and political science at the University of the South Pacific.

Lee Kava is a hafekasi musician and poet who just completed her MA in Pacific Islands Studies at UH Mānoa. Her work focuses on music as an expression of Tongan identities and a medium for creative and political activism. She is also a former student and graduate assistant to Tara, and is very honored to have been able to collaborate on a piece for West Papua with her teacher.

Bryan Kamaoli Kuwada believes in the power and potential of ea, of life, of breath, of rising, of sovereignty, because he sees it all around him, embodied in the ʻāina, the kai, his family, his friends, and his beautiful community. He is a long-time Ph.D. candidate in English at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, focusing on translation theory.

Brandy Nālani McDougall (from Maui) and Craig Santos Perez (from Guahan) are poets and professors who teach at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.

Winner of the 2014 Intro Prize in Poetry by Four Way Books for his first fulllength collection The Taxidermist’s Cut (spring 2016), Rajiv Mohabir received fellowships from Voices of Our Nation’s Artist foundation, Kundiman, and the American Institute of Indian Studies language program. His poetry and

translations are internationally published or forthcoming from journals such as Best American Poetry 2015, Prairie Schooner, Crab Orchard Review, Drunken Boat, Anti-, Great River Review, PANK, and Aufgabe. He received his MFA in poetry and translation from Queens College, CUNY, where he was editor in chief of the Ozone Park Literary Journal. Currently he is pursuing a PhD in English from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa.

Jocelyn Ng, Harrison Ines, Malia Derden, and Sarah Daniels are Pacific Tongues adult facilitators and youth poets. They have represented the state of Hawaii on National Slam stages and actively try to spread spoken arts education throughout Oʻahu.

Jamaica Osorio and Noʻu Revilla were blessed to attend the Wansolwara Dance in Madang, PNG, in 2014, where they learned more about West Papua and the inspiring ways solidarity in Oceania can look/feel/live like. Mahalo, Wansolwara.

Jonathan Kay Kamakawiwoʻole Osorio is an activist and a full professor at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Co-editor of The Value of Hawaiʻi: Knowing the Past and Shaping the Future and author of Dismembering Lāhui: A History of the Hawaiian Nation to 1887, he is an inspiring composer and singer. He has been a Hawaiian music-recording artist since 1975.

Culture Shocka (Justin Takaha White) is the only son of Mineko Takaha and Andrew White, born and raised on the island of Oʻahu in the mid-eighties. He uses a modern and minimalist-inspired approach to his visual art, mixing equal parts cartooning and graphic design. He tell stories that imagine alternate futures.

He tells stories that honor the people and places of his past. And he tells stories to inspire anyone else on the journey of becoming an artist. For more of his work check out www.cultureshocka.com Lyz Soto believes in decolonizing love and empowerment through community engagement and spoken arts education. She is co-founder of Pacific Tongues and long time mother of a generous and beautiful young man, who has taught her more than she has taught him. She is also a Ph.D. student in English at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. ~~ Contributing visual artists, including Anonymous, Luseane Raass, and Raymond Mulitalo, participated in the March 11, 2015, artists workshop. We are grateful to share their work with you in this collection.

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