by Shantell Powell
The sounds of heavy machinery drowned out the cry of baby robins. Nakturalik ran downstairs and out the door. She stood with her hands on her hips on the front step. Another severed branch slammed down, this time into her three sisters’ garden. She had watered the pumpkin, corn, and pole bean seedlings just a few hours ago, before the day got too hot. Now they were collateral damage.
“What are you doing?” demanded Nakturalik.
One worker walked over, turning off the woodhipper and pulling out his earplugs. “What?”
“Why are you doing this? And why are you doing it during nesting season?” The man looked over to the mutilated tree and then to the chipper. “Uh, I appreciate your concern–”
“I don’t think you do,” interrupted Nakturalik. “You are throwing baby birds into a woodchipper. These trees shouldn’t be coming down, but if you must destroy them, why now? Why during nesting season?”
He scratched his neck and looked back at her. “These are the City of Kitchener’s trees.”
“Trees don’t belong to a city. They belong to the land.”
“Look,” he said. “We need to cut them down right away. They’re a hazard. See how close they are to the lines?” He gestured up to where insulated wires pierced through foliage.
“Yup. And they’ve been like that for years, so why now?”
“We only received our orders last week.”
“Why?”
He shrugged.
“Has the City of Kitchener consulted with Six Nations over this?”
“I don’t have that information, ma’am.”
“The Haudenosaunee have a moratorium in place on destruction and development. This should not be happening without their consent. Kitchener is part of the Haldimand Tract, and this is their territory.”
“I hear what you are saying,” said the man. As he spoke, another branch crashed down, missing her sweetgrass only because it came to rest atop a naked H-stake. Nakturalik’s hands shot to her mouth. A “This is Indian Land” sign had been on that stake. Now the wire frame was stripped of its message. This was the third time someone had stolen the purple and white sign. At least the stake had saved the sweetgrass. She let her hands sink back down. “You’re dropping and dragging branches through my garden.” The man looked cross now. “We are doing our best not to damage it, ma’am. You don’t really think we are trying to destroy your garden, do you?”
Nakturalik was shaking like those leaves. “This whole region was once a garden. These two sugar maples are the last shade trees left on the block. All the others have been cut down. Where are the birds supposed to nest now?”
He took a deep breath, then held his palms up toward Nakturalik in a placating gesture. “Hey, I’m just doing my job.”
“And so am I,” said Nakturalik. She was a land defender. The trouble was, she didn’t feel like a very good one. Although she took good care of her yard, the neighbourhood’s ecology was in decline. Last summer, the huge silver maple with its tire swing in the neighbour’s backyard had been cut down and the crows who’d favoured the tree hadn’t returned. Nakturalik’s own yard, which had always been pleasantly cool on even the hottest of days, lost all its shade. Though the sun-loving plants thrived, she was having a hard time keeping the woodland herbs healthy.
The worker cleared his throat and took a half-step back. “We’ll be all done and out of your hair soon,” he promised, while backing away and stuffing his earplugs back in. The conversation was over.
He flipped the switch back on for the wood chipper while Nakturalik retreated to her doorstep and wrung her hands. It felt like someone was tightening a belt around her chest and her breathing was quick and shallow. Normally, when she was upset, she’d go for a walk, but there weren’t any nice places to walk anymore. Walking around the deteriorating neighbourhood only fed her anxieties. Just around the corner, the copse of old-growth trees which hid a petroleum plant had been felled. Stripped and debarked logs lay in neat piles amongst the destruction and yellow bulldozers. Without the filtration of the leaves, a thick pall of dust covered the area, and the humus dried up and blew away. Nakturalik had no idea where the foxes, raccoons, possums, and skunks who lived there had gone.
She went back inside, closing the door behind her. If she wasn’t careful, she’d have a full-blown anxiety attack. She struggled to control her breathing. She couldn’t even enjoy the park around the corner anymore. The chokecherries, high-bush cranberry, and staghorn sumac ringing it had been chopped down for no apparent reason. She used to forage there to make jelly. There’d be no more jelly for her, and no more berries for the birds. Instead of trees and meadow, there was a vast expanse of half-dead lawn. Poison had been applied to every single dandelion that dared rear its head, and the native plants she’d guerrilla gardened had been mowed down. To top it off, the local community garden with its magnificent wildflower fields had been paved over a few months prior and replaced by an equipment yard. No wonder bees and monarch butterflies were endangered. Nakturalik’s tiny yard with its native flora was more important now than ever.
The chainsaws roared back to life, loud as helicopters. It jolted her from her thoughts. The maples had received their death sentence. While she watched through her front window, the tree furthest away from her medicine garden was decapitated. The amputated limbs heaped around its trunk looked like a pyre intended for burning witches.
It was time to contact the city yet again. In the years since she’d moved here, she’d written innumerable letters to the editor and local politicians, complained on social media, taken to the streets with banners and round dancers, and called up developers about the continuing destruction of habitat. It had all been for naught. Would this time be any different? Probably not, but she had to make the effort.
She stomped back up the stairs to her room and sat down at her desk. She closed the blinds. She couldn’t bear to watch the continuing destruction. She fired up her computer and logged in to the complaints page on the City of Kitchener’s website. “To whom it may concern,” she typed. “I hear land acknowledgments all the time, but I’ve yet to see any good come from them. The words are empty. My neighbourhood is being destroyed. All its wooded areas have been chopped and bulldozed over the past two years, and now the beautiful sugar maples next to my garden are being cut down during the height of nesting season. Why is this being done? Where are the animals supposed to live? How does this fit in with the city’s pledge of reconciliation when Indigenous communities have not been consulted?”
She clicked the send button and rolled back in her chair. The chainsaws were still going strong and now her head ached as much as her heart.
Find out how Nakturalik’s magic confronts
the societal powers in the upcoming “Iridescence” anthology.
Shantell Powell, citizen of Canada, is a writer, artist, and storyteller who enjoys writing in most genres, including that which highlights the culture of Indigenous communities. Her range of hobbies include throat singing, weightlifting, hiking, foraging, waterfall rappelling, playing the lip harp, dancing, backwoods camping, and kayaking. Powell explains that “‘The Tupilaq’ is a love story to the land I live on: the Haldimand Tract in so-called Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.”
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