‘The Last Cacique’
— Reneé Bibby
American Thanksgiving is an ideal day to read Elizabeth Acevedo’s ‘The Last Cacique,’ about the last days of the Jaragua chief and resistance fighter Anacaona. The poem is not lighthearted fare, nor is it explicitly connected to Thanksgiving, even if it is a great Thanksgiving poem. I am not hypocritical enough to condemn the holiday, yet partake in it; after all, I am going to gather with friends and family around a traditional turkey today. But, between gushing over pie and debating naps, maybe we could take a moment to acknowledge how the lovely fruit of our family-focused holiday grew from bloodied, poisoned roots. Massacres of indigenous people across the Americas, the gnarled and broken branching of our country. While Acevedo’s poem is about the land we currently call Haiti and the Dominican Republic—it’s fundamentally a poem about colonialism. It’s the story of a specific, powerful woman, but it’s easy to see how it could apply to the United States, a story of names forgotten by history within our own country. Celebrate today, but also, remember.