They send their hound A steady hand

He lands he listens he takes his stand "Keep them quiet

Hold them tight Let them bend don't let them fight

His men move first Their boots sink deep

A broken word A cut too cheap

The runner moves The word is passed

The blades are ready No one asks

The first arrive The first to stand

More will come That's the plan

Maps were drawn Borders traced

My island marked A quiet fate

A man in halls A hand outstretched

A warning laid beneath his breath "They'll come in gold

They'll come with trade They'll write the laws

Then take the blade" His voice was calm

His hands were clean He never thought what it would mean

The jungle burns The sky turns black

No walls left to hold them back

No chains to lock No names to sign

Just bodies sinking into time

They wrote the laws They set the weight

They made the cause Now through the trees we hunt them down

The fire moves No way out now

One turns He lifts his hands

The first to break to understand

Too late…

His body drops The leaves don't stir

The vines reclaim what once was hers

I move in quiet  not to mourn

But mark the place where war was born

They called it peace they called it right

But peace with chains is still a fight

Their ledgers bled their hands were clean

While mine were dark from what they'd seen

They taught us names not ours to keep

Built stone on graves too deep to sleep

But in that stone we found a knife

And carved the cost of every life

I walk where maps once crossed in ink

Each border drawn along a brink

They framed the land in silent lies

And thought the soil would never rise

But roots remember trees still hear

The whispered plans the rising fear

And now they tread where we lay still

Not ghosts… but teeth and fire and will

No prayer will stall what's come to pass

Their tide is turning slow and vast

The books they wrote now feed our flame

Their names will die!

We were never yours to tame

Never carved to fit your name

We bent in storms we broke in rain

But not for you  not for your chain

Our drums still beat beneath this land

Not bought not sold not held by hand

You took the shore you tried the flame

But the roots still burn and speak my name

They sit in halls with softened tone

Debating lands they've never known

A thousand miles a world away

Still sure their word will make us stay

But out here where the tree-line ends

There's no such thing as making friends

They taught us silence fear and grace

We learned instead to track and chase

Their ships arrive  we watch we wait

The tides don't care for foreign fate

And if they land and if they last

They'll meet the echo of the past

You gave us names and dressed our hair

And smiled as if the world was fair

But every "gift" was carved from threat

A kindness paid in steel and debt

Now I stand tall with ash-stained skin

A leader not because of him

But from the soil the salt the night

That raised me fierce enough to fight

You lit the torch  we brought the flame

You took our voice  we took your name

And now it's carved into the bark

Not yours in ink but ours in mark

We were never yours to win

Not by blood or tongue or sin

We've bled too deep to turn away

This war was born the second day

No crown will pass no flags will wave

We write our story from the grave

And as you flee or as you stay

just know Nalani never walks the other way