Orlando Cervantes “Two Firefighting Short Essays” (essay

Spring 2022

Invisible Woman Jolee Magoosh Author’s note: This poem deserves a little back story. I want to honor the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls all across the country. There have been unfortunate events that have unfolded for many generations, and have been ignored for centuries. My contribution to these women is to aggressively express the fight that Indigenous women face everyday.

She flourishes in her jewelry, turquoise wrapped in silver. The sparkle of her identity lies within her hair, her smile, her native tongue. She speaks proudly to her mother. She is immaculate like a soaring eagle through a broken field.

She is scared. She sees a beauty being destroyed. She sees the women burning in flames, suffocating in the fires. She screams but no one looks at her. They walk past her. Help! She screams louder. The sirens go right by her. She cries. The sirens fade. Silence…

They’re burning, she is burning. She suffocates in silence. Nothing but a single thought, that fades in the smoke. In the sky. Into darkness.

Crowds of people look at the ashes, wondering what they’ve could’ve done. Wondering how they can help. When all they needed to do was listen. Listen to the girl screaming.

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