The Lokia By Graciela Huinao And Like The Leaves

et, even though the two poems, The Lokia, written by Graciela Huinao and Like the Leaves poet by Humberto Ak’abal shows that the scars of the Indian society using symbolism, is also stated to instead of living as a role as a bystander, be a character that is an upstander that stands against the injustices towards the Native Americans. In The Lokia, the poet writes the Loika singing, as the nest was stolen from the Loika. Huinao wrote, “Why does the loika sing?/ If the earth where he was going to nest/ has been stolen./ He’ll have to look for new lands. /He takes off singing “(Huinao, stanza 2). The home that the Loika has once lived, was taken away from him, leaving the birds to sing melancholy for its loss. The unspeakable actions that the Native American did, to themselves, to their culture, and to their society, ruin the hearts of every Native American.

The Native couldn’t even endeavor to help prevent the white authority to seize the Native’s property.

And the effect of that action, cause an injury, not physical but emotional to the hearts of the Native society. And in order to obstruct any more agony, the poet of The Loika, Graciela Huinao, is proclaiming the Natives to stand up for themselves. Fight for the Native’s justice, fight for the people, for culture, and the society or a place that Native can call a ‘home’. Be a protector, be a guardian that can bring success and bliss to their own people. The poem is a message to all Native Americans, to take a risk, even though that it may not work, but the tiniest actions can bring a spark of courage to the people; that can change everything around them. Similarity, to another poem Like the Leaves, written by Humberto Ak’abal, expresses that leaves and a tree are an analogy connection to people. Ak’abal wrote, “ Forgetting is like leaves/ Some fall others are born/ They stop being leaves/ only when the tree/ stops being a tree” (Ak’abal, stanza 1-3). The trees and leaves are the nature of a Native

American. What created or made Native American unique is based on the culture and their identities that are different from other races. Yet, when the Native people are forced to forget their cultures, are like the shedding of the leaves. And once it falls, it can’t be attached back. The loss of strength and courage is what the Natives absence to have. And this poem that the author, Humberto Ak’abal is trying to pronounce is that, is to end the responsibility of each every Native American as being a bystander. Being one doesn’t make any changes to it just creates the condition of the Natives suffering from injustices to increase even more. The lack of action is what made the Native weak and powerless. And the Natives need to change that. To become a ‘hero’ that can restrain the White from the endless maltreatment towards the Natives. To be a victor, to be an upstander that can defend. To be a warrior that can shelter the hearts of every single Native American from getting hurt. To prevent anymore despondency for the Native. To the heart and the body.