(for michelle sylliboy)
wood element             green

and young yang

              turns the cycle pushing wood through water

dook chung! (rattle rattle rattle)

                                        dook dook dook
dook chung!
time

              latitude north

                                                     longitude west

                                                                                            winds, weather and remarks
t. hudson’s receipt for two hundred and three sea-otter skins
                                                                               a boat then             iphigenia nubiana

200 tons burthen

              self-sacrificing daughter who dies for father and country

which?
it’s 1788             virginal

iphigenia crosses water  	
                           under command

of mr. douglas “officer of considerable merit, who was well acquainted with

the coast of America” meaning Canada-to-come

our home on native land
              here comes another

metal element             copper bottomed

felice, ever faithful
to cross the northern pacific

sailing the long arc of the sandwich islands

from wampoa to nootka sound

captain john meares at the helm

and passengers tianna prince of atooi

winee of hawaii

a boy and a man from maui

and comekela, a nuu-chah-nulth man

ghosting back

multi-critical
and what? a chinese crew?! for both ships?

partially—

“The Chinese were, on this occasion, shipped as an experiment : — they have been

generally esteemed an hardy, and industrious , as well as ingenious race of people;

they live on fish and rice, and, requiring but low wages, it was a matter also of

œconomical consideration….” 
o economical

              an ode owed

old owl says it was all about the otter

sea otters in water

pots and kettles for pelts

metal melts or oxidizes into air
up and down the coast meares and douglas trading

ditidaht

              coast salish

                           nuu-chah-nulth

                                                     kwakwaka’wakw

                                        heiltsuk

                           tsimshian

              haida

lingit

pot for pelts

markets for canton system

British East India Company vs. Cohong

with Hoppo to collect taxes for Qing Emperor

and the Thirteen Factories where it all went down

pelts for porcelain 	and tea for two

the global snowball

              already gathering steam
                                                                               this is the house that meares built

                                                                  or rather his chinese carpenters

                                                     the wood of our rather not

                                        this is the cannon emplacement

                           built by chinese smiths

              and for the water–

a schooner: the north west america
this is the house that douglas tore down

dishonouring the promise

meares made to nuu-chah-nulth

              who built?                            whose wood?

                           who forged?                            whose metal?

and later, who destroyed?

                                                     whose axe?

                                                                               whose hammer? 
i’ve been working on the railway

all the live long day
              sing a song for the wood and metal men

              who crossed the water east to get west

              to make the world go the other way round
              trade roots

              contact of our always already

              between the lines of which

              we might have become family
britain vs america vs spain

spill crisis at nootka

strain for colonial sovereignity

when martínez beat out meares, douglas, kendrick, funter

where did the chinese smiths and carpenters go?

                                                                                            to san blas as captured crew?

              to china?

                                        to death?

or into hiding

              among coast salish

              kwakwaka’wakh

              nuu-chal-nulth

              stó:lō

              secwepemc
                           the qing once self-sufficient

                           giving trade itself as gift

                           undone by opium
                                                     iphigenia smoked by the treaty of nanjing

                                                     my home on ceded land

                                                     recolonized by the master of all trades

                                                     trade
water nurtures wood

iphigenia crosses east to get west

unceded columbia

calls in the ghosts
callicum

                                                                                                                                   maquinna

                                                     wicananish

              hanna

                                                                                                         detootche

                           comekela

                                                                                                                      acchon aching
aching for earth’s return