There exists a historical and ongoing issue of cultural erasure faced by many Americans in the United States. Mixed-race individuals in America often feel torn between different cultural identities. Post 2020 has brought about cultural reflections and highlighted a broader cultural struggle in modern America, where people of mixed heritage often feel disconnected from both their ancestral roots and the dominant culture in which they were raised.   
Identity, cultural displacement, generational trauma, and the search for personal and ancestral truth, resonates deeply in post-2020 America, particularly within the context of indigenous heritage, mixed-race identity, and the legacy of colonization. Historical revisionism, is where families, communities, and entire nations sometimes choose to suppress painful aspects of history to maintain a specific narrative. This is highlighted by the tension between erased cultural histories, the desire to reconnect with lost roots, and the internal conflict many people feel in contemporary American society when trying to reconcile complex, marginalized identities. It is important to continue to reflect on the contemporary identity politics that permeate American society today. 

Call Me White Bird: The Story of a White-Washed Indian
Cast by secrets deep, “Grandfather, who was he?” I asked. My mother’s eyes, a tempest, flashed anger, then a pained glance.
A question with a wound, yet a child’s heart is inquisitive of the past. A sadness, deep, unspoken grief, a story bound by silence, brief.
“We don’t go there,” her words a shield, “We do not speak, he’s dead to me”. Yet persistence danced within my core, yearning for the truth, for more.
A painful truth, sealed. Yet I yearned to grasp the roots of ancestry. “He was an Indian,” she let slip, but then, her sorrow tightened her lip.
Generations weep, a silent flood, ancestral wounds, the echo of Spirit Raven lures. Spirit of the Raven, wise, whisper to me truths, dispel the lies. We are red by blood, though whitewashed wood, the pain persists, and loss endures.
No Indian name, no tribal song, my Raven sings and in my veins, I belong. With hunger in my heart to know, I plead for more, a quest profound…
“If you persist, you will not be my daughter,” she said, a threat born of a past misread. I pressed, relentlessly, for truth. In silence, my questions resound.

Whitewashed yet, the Raven’s flight, speaks of lineage, hidden from sight. Over the years, morsels of truth would seep, but never enough to quench my hunger, my thirst,
Yet blood persists, despite the fray, a heritage
lost, in night’s array. A drip-feed of secrets,
a legacy,
a tale of a grandfather, and of a family cursed.
The Spirit Raven, a feathered creed, a guide to where my roots bleed. I learned of a past, a love society defied, my grandfather, a phantom’s face…
A white girl of wealth, a boy who was red, they with-child, disowned and forced to wed. A silence
kept, a truth denied, lurking in the shadows of time.
“Do not seek more!” my mother said in stern despair as anger cut through the air. A tribe unknown, a heritage lost, “I am blood,” I cried in vain.
A white bird in a world of shade, Whitewashed,
like the Spirit Raven who made tears fall into a river of pain, a heavy cost. Whitewashed, I felt the strain—
of a lineage stained by hidden shame, a grandfather
I could not name. In the shadow of the Spirit Raven’s flight, blood binds us to the ancient flood.
In the hush of a curious child’s plea, I sought the roots of my legacy. A heritage is hidden. We are blood, though whitewashed wood. A history veiled, in my mother’s gaze, emotions sailed.

He—a loving father, in times of peace, but war’s cruel touch—a demon’s embrace. The man returned, a stranger in guise, drunk on war’s poison, cruel in his eyes.
A gentle soul, love’s sweet release, transformed into a specter, a haunting face. “Your grandfather,” she spoke at last, a demon born from battle’s cast.
“We do not talk of it!” her words declared, disowned by kin, friends turned away. In my mother’s eyes, a tempest’s brew, flashed anger, sadness, a silent rue.
“You’ll never meet him.” pain ensnare a father changed by war’s dismay. Through veils of time, the story weaves, generational wounds only the heart conceives.
A heritage fractured, a lineage scarred, no tribe to claim, no ancestral call. Can I call myself an Indian,
I yearn. Being whitewashed, still, I burn.
Within me is a flame unmarred, in my veins, the blood ties enthrall. The Spirit Raven, my companion unseen, a shadowed guide, in the in-between.
In the pain of loss, in the silence sown, whitewashed, yet the blood runs true. Call me White Bird, in a world colored red. Spirit Raven, guides me to my path ahead.
I carry the weight of history unknown, a paradox, a mystery to pursue. White Bird flying, whitewashed, yet Spirit Raven’s call, sings of ancestry, binding all.