What is your first tree memory?

Climbing toward a feeling, climbing toward away.

Tree as escape cover,

or a place to hide.

–

Mine was a plum thicket near the river that ran behind my Grandparent’s house.

Its branches were gnarly.

We had to crawl into the middle on our hands and knees.

Individually, wild plum trees are short-lived, but they spread through their roots to form dense thickets.

Some plum trees live to be 30 or even 50 years old, but a community of plum trees can persist much longer than any single tree trunk.

We used to suck plums clean off their seed, spitting the hard pits onto the ground.

Today, there are trees in that thicket that might’ve been planted with our spit, still be bearing fruit today.

–

There was another tree I’d grown used to visiting, but mostly in my mind.

I was in my 30s, a new mother.

I would visit this large tree in the park just across the street from our apartment as I drifted off to sleep each night.

I’d look at this tree while I sat in a rocking chair, nursing my newborn.

One day it was just gone, no ceremony or warning.

–

The sign here at the Lost 40 says WALK GENTLY.

I don’t take this as a warning or even as a command, but an invitation.

To WALK GENTLY among trees.

–

When a color isn’t fast,

when it fades from the brightest hues to sepia,

we call that Fugitive Color.

That word, fugitive, comes from the latin fugere, which means "to flee" –

Fugitive Color describes how the color seems to run away or vanish with time.

–

Is this a fugitive forest?

One that escapes by not fleeing?

It’s been here all along, this place – stealing time from the maps.

In my middle years of walking gently,

I’m learning to honor illegibility, to celebrate confusion, and to seek the wisdom of misread maps.

There are paths you can only communicate through shared experience and expression, unified by songlines and other carefully held ceremonies.

–

An old tree falls, and no one person is there to hear it,

but who cares if they did?

It’s death makes a sudden tunnel through the lost forest,

and for a moment you can see and hear in its absence,

an abundance of life emerging - life that surrounds a fallen tree, unadjusted to its new arrangement.

Imagine,

a tree falls,

and an entire forest

is there to hear it.

Written in place on 10/25/26 for the Lost 40 Sound Garden project. Photo from the Old Growth Forest Network.

09/14/26
Dear DNR Tamarack EAW Project Manager,

I live in rural Aitkin County on the Mississippi River, downstream of the proposed Tamarack nickel project. I’m a single mother and my children and I harvest from this region in every season, alongside our Anishinaabe neighbors, including fish from these lakes and rivers, wild rice from areas directly downstream of the proposed mine site, and medicine plants that can only be found in this kind of abundance within our globally rare peatland ecology.

I share many concerns with my neighbors about the environmental impacts and public health risks of the proposed Tamarack project, including the impacts of mining and dewatering on our local lakes, streams, and wetlands.

I am also concerned, after visiting with Talon’s scientific team a couple of years ago, and touring the Eagle Mine with members of the Community Environmental Monitoring Program (CEMP) that is funded by Eagle (now part of Talon Metals), that the sampling strategies used here and there may not adequately address the way water is held and altered as it moves through complex wetlands, or the cumulative effects of increased sulfides on methylmercury in the food web, with its related health risks.

I understand that Big Sandy Lake and Minnewawa are impaired for nutrients, and that even very small increases in sulfide pollution in these wetlands and waters can have a compounding effect. For example, if waste rock needs to be stored on site for any amount of time, and if Talon’s proposed and unstudied “Mine in a Box” is not feasible, we could still see significant increases in sulfide from mining activity like they’ve reported at Eagle Mine in Michigan.

How can you even evaluate how likely this scenario really is, if you continue to allow Talon to downplay the scope of their intended mining project here, and if you do not require feasibility studies at this critical stage?

The assessments of these environmental impacts cannot be done in an isolated way, as groundwater and surface water here is abundant, it moves, and its movements are complex.

It floods often here, everyone knows this. There are artesian conditions in many places that are not documented on any groundwater atlas. There are also a lot of gravel deposits that have an impact on water movements close to the surface, and Talon’s proposal documents include a note that they could require an average of 551,000-772,000 tons of aggregate per year during operations to backfill their mine, because they intend to ship everything to Michigan.

Where will that gravel come from? How will this sharp increase in gravel mining impact not only this proposed mine, but other ecological conditions in our area? And what would all these gravel deposits and pits mean for the movement of water as Talon expands their mine, which they’ve said to investors in numerous places that they intend to do, while pursuing a small permit for the current known resource.

The attached presentation by XXXXXX, a geologist who has studied gravel deposits in our area and who spoke to the Tamarack Water Alliance about unique aspects of the region where the Tamarack project is located, may provide additional context for the complexity of the surficial geology here and its relationship to groundwater.

(1) Attachment: Aitkin County Glacial Geology and How it Relates to Water

In addition to these environmental impacts and needs for further study, my comment is about the relationship between Talon Metals (Rio Tinto–Kennecott), the Minnesota DNR, and our small community. Specifically, it is about the erosion of trust that has already occurred, and ways that the MN DNR might restore some of that trust.

First, we have been in this place with your agency before, and not that long ago.

The scoping and EIS of the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline was flawed.

Scientists working for the DNR even made comments against the new route through water-rich Aitkin County, citing elevated risks to groundwater and sensitive wetland ecologies, but those comments were apparently ignored in the final scoping and EIS.

Because Enbridge was working without an EIS that prioritized regional groundwater and surface water study, and appropriate monitoring protocols that take into account the unique hydrology of places like Aitkin County, Enbridge proceeded with construction techniques that led to numerous aquifer breaches, drilling fluid spills and frac outs, and did documented damage to aquifers, as well as sensitive and rare wetland ecosystems. [Something we are watching them repeat right now with Line 5 in Northern Wisconsin.]

Many of these damages were not reported immediately, and may never have been reported were it not for citizen science monitors.

The attached report includes much more detail about this situation, and should be required reading for agency staff tasked with evaluating Talon’s proposal.

(2) Attachment: Line 3 and the Myth of Environmental Protection

In terms of Talon Metals/Rio Tinto and the Minnesota DNR’s relationship with our communities, Lands and Minerals Director Joe Henderson recently gave a presentation about the permitting process to people in the town of Emily, where a different mining company is proposing a manganese mine only a few dozen miles from Tamarack.

I attended because I live close to both projects and I spend time in both communities. In his presentation to the Emily community, Henderson commented on Talon’s plans to ship their waste out of Minnesota, explaining how this update to their proposed project meant we did not need to be concerned about as many issues.

It’s no surprise that the mining company in Emily is now making the same claim, that they will ship ore out of state for processing. It’s like they’ve all been told this is a way to fast-track their proposals.

Henderson cited the Eagle Mine in Michigan as a “model mine” where they’ve been mining for years without concern. He also showed a picture of one of Talon’s drills and remarked that it is quieter and more high-tech than drills of the past.

Joe Henderson gave what seemed to many locals like a reassuring “marketing pitch” about the rigor of the permitting process at the request of the mining company. He did so alongside mining company sub-contractors from Barr Engineering, and the Director of Mining Minnesota, a lobbying group that promotes sulfide mining in conjunction with elected officials who represent our area in the state legislature.

Why is the DNR marketing a mining company project to a nearby town, especially when Talon Metals is in the middle of a public comment period?

How can we “trust the process” when it seems that the MN DNR has already decided the scope of concern, even before any feasibility studies or public comment hearings had been completed?

In another example in 2023, a former Assistant Director of DNR Lands & Minerals, gave a very similar “marketing” presentation to members of our community in Tamarack, using many of the same DNR slides and documents. When pressed by members of the community, he reluctantly disclosed that he was being paid as a consultant by Talon Metals and Rio Tinto.

Two years later, this same former DNR official wrote an Opinion piece for MinnPost that called requests by members of our community, research scientists, and WaterLegacy for a regional study of our area a "delay tactic."

His bio mentioned his work for the MN DNR, but did not list his consulting work for Talon Metals and Rio Tinto until I reached out to MinnPost to bring this to attention.

Neither of these presentations mentioned the many significant impacts members of our communities have already reported from Talon’s drilling program, including the nuisance of the sounds and vibrations of these drills and the frequency of driller traffic near Talon’s main drill site, to the unlined drilling fluid sumps and uncapped drill borings that are already putting our streams and our drinking water wells at risk.

In 2023, we started to notice images in media stories about the Talon project that showed drilling fluid sumps, and nearby, dying trees. I’ve since learned that these sumps are placed on land owned by Rio Tinto-Kennecott. This is where Talon’s drilling crews dump their drilling wastes, which include drilling fluids, water that has been used in drilling and has come into contact with minerals thousands of feet below the ground, and highly-reactive shavings from high-sulfide ores that have been drilled.

I pointed this out to a film crew from PBS news hour, and they approached Talon Metals with this question in a 2023 PBS news broadcast.

(3) Attachment: Transcript from PBS News broadcast in which Talon explains their sumps

Talon’s response at the time to a question from PBS about why these trees were dying, was that they had piled too much earth on the roots of these trees. Following the broadcast, this drilling fluid sump was promptly removed. Members of our community have been back to photograph this site recently, and even though it has been three years since these sumps were removed, trees continue to die in a radial pattern, where no additional dirt has been piled on their roots. The attached photos show this and other apparent damage to wetlands from these unlined sumps.

(4) Attachment: Photos of Talon Metals drilling fluid sumps in 2023, 2024 and 2026

Community members have continued to monitor this and other drill sites by Talon Metals. They operate 5 drills in our small community 24/7 and have made hundreds of borings across the entire 13 mile long deposit controlled by Rio Tinto–Kennecott, including in Salo Marsh in the southern part of the deposit.

One of these borings is of particular interest, because no one is sure if it was ever completed, but it shows Rio Tinto and Talon Metals’ interest in the southern half of the deposit they control.

In the attached letter written by an official from the MN Department of Health (MDH) to several different people at the DNR, a meeting is discussed that happened between MDH officials, Rio Tinto, and Talon Metals, concerning a "joint venture" which included a request to drill a 7000 foot deep boring into the southern part of the deposit, which they refer to as "the bowl."

The bowl is part of the deposit that is NOT considered at all in current scoping and EIS documents, and which Talon claims they do not intend to mine in the future.

(5) Attachment: MDH to MN DNR Letter concerning Rio Tinto and Talon 7000 ft boring

In this letter, they discuss a variance (an exemption from well code) to do this type of drilling, because 7000 feet is extreme, and they would have to use different drills than the ones pictured here at their current drill site.

(6) Attachment: Photos of Talon’s exploratory drills in wetlands, near an unnamed stream that locals refer to as “Birch Creek”

I don't know if they were ever allowed to make this experimental boring into the bowl, but they've been drilling in that area for many years, including adjacent to Salo Marsh. They speak to investors as though this is all part of their mining district.

In March of 2024, around the time this boring was proposed, a friend of mine was having a beer in McGregor and a couple of drillers walked in after their shift. They are easy to spot, because they wear high visibility vests and are usually from out of town, with Canadian or Michigan license plates.

As they had a few beers, they were talking about their "temporary job" in Aitkin County. These were not Talon drillers, this was a special crew. They said they were not there to look for nickel, "We're here for palladium"

Palladium is platinum group metal. It's extremely rare and worth a lot of money. If it's sitting 7000 feet deep beneath these protected wetlands, that also means it's likely very expensive and risky to get at it.

[I noticed today, after this comment was submitted - that Talon has now added Palladium, Gold, and other precious metals to their list of targets ... Their investors are watching this public comment phase too.]

Talon Metals and the MN DNR both know that "the bowl" has rare and precious metals of interest to these mining companies, but when the MN DNR asked Talon Metals whether or not it's likely they will expand their proposed mine at any time in the future ... For example, into the southern part of the deposit, which is in the Kettle-St. Croix area, and near Rice Lakes Refuge. Talon said no, and the MN DNR is allowing them to downplay the project scope.

Why is the MN DNR pretending that they don't know about the size and scale of this deposit, and all that's at risk?

Is the MN Department of Health unconcerned, or have they been "cut out" of some of these conversations?

Did they grant this variance and allow this 7000 foot boring? If so, why wasn't it noted in Talon's exploratory drilling permit?

Was it Talon drilling here as part of the "The Tamarack Project"- or are Rio Tinto and Talon Metals simultaneously developing another mining project here ... So they can move forward with the Tamarack Nickel project while denying further interests?

When I sought more information about Talon’s drilling program from Minnesota DNR and other state agencies, I learned that already, state agencies are failing to protect us, while the revolving door between Talon Metals and the Minnesota DNR continues to turn.

I am going to use one example to illustrate this revolving door, but there are many others, this is just one of the most egregious.

When I requested information about Talon Metals and Rio Tinto-Kennecott’s unsealed borings, I learned that the record of which borings and how many are unsealed is not available in digital form, so there is no way to see the record of exemptions these companies received from the standard well code. We do know that there are hundreds of borings in the area near the Talon Mine, where there are dozens of drinking water wells.

Some of the wells in this area are monitoring wells drilled by Rio Tinto-Kennecott to help monitor water conditions for their environmental impact studies. Some of those are on property that, at the time of drilling, was owned by a local resident named XXXXXXX.

Their name might be familiar to you because they now work for the Minnesota DNR.

But before this, their childhood home was the place where Rio Tinto-Kennecott made their big discovery. This property, and the property where the monitoring wells were drilled, were eventually bought from this family by Rio Tinto.

The property where Talon proposes to build their “mine in a box” is this property, which sold for $2 million dollars in a poor rural community.

The child in this family went on to become an environmental scientist and was working for Rio Tinto at the time that Talon Metals began doing “community engagement” events here.

They would tell a story about how Rio Tinto discovered the nickel under the kitchen sink, and how they didn’t trust Rio Tinto at first, but now they work for them, and are also a shareholder of Talon Metals.

When I requested documents from the DNR about Talon’s drilling program, including reports about concerns with drilling fluid sumps and borings, the employee the DNR had gather and retrieve this data to fulfill my request was also XXXXXXX, who had only recently transferred from Rio Tinto and Talon Metals to the DNR, and was now a Mine Project Planner working on ... the proposed Tamarack nickel project.

How is this not a conflict of interest?

If nothing else, it sends a message to our small community that not only does the MN DNR not take seriously the harm that a company known around the world for corruption, bribery, and destruction is already causing here, you also don’t seem to care what it looks like to people on the ground. To us, it looks like the Minnesota DNR, and many of our political representatives, have been captured by industry and cannot be trusted with the work of managing our natural resources.

From my point of view, the Minnesota DNR is allowing these companies to take advantage of loopholes in existing state codes, and is dismissing the real concerns of frontline communities, while collaborating to help market the unpopular and unstudied projects of International mining companies to other agencies and the public.

In 2022 during the early phases of Talon’s initial EAW, members of our community met with Talon Metals and toured their drill rigs and core shed. We asked many of these same questions then.

After all, we know that no sulfide mine has ever been developed in such a wet place, and that nonferrous mines, including the Flambeau and Eagle mines in Wisconsin and Michigan, both developed by Rio Tinto-Kennecott, are exceeding permitted pollution levels that would protect aquatic life.

We also know, because we talk to other communities about their experiences, that this is all part of the Rio Tinto playbook.

The Eagle Mine *is* a model mine, but not because it is exceptional. It is a model mine because this is also how they did things in Michigan, and already, that mine is exceeding safe limits for pollution and expanding like a spider.

Although Talon touts that they have an “open door” policy, our scientific questions were never answered, and we still have not seen any data or reports that would help us understand and trust that Talon can do what they propose without harming nearby waters, wetlands, aquifers, air quality, and our community health.

Much more study is needed, and Talon needs to be honest about the scope of their intended mining activity here.

My ask with respect to the scoping decision is to just listen to what Talon and Rio Tinto have been saying: They intend to build a mining district here, not a small mine-in-a-box.

Talon Metals now owns and operates the Eagle Mine as part of this mining district. Failing to see the obvious connections and the playbook they’re using is negligent. Our communities deserve transparency and truth.

Only a regional study of impacts that mining here would have on groundwater, surface water, wetlands, and human health can possibly cover the true risks of this scale of mining project. We also deserve a cumulative impacts assessment of increasing sulfide in nutrient-impaired waters and in bogs and peatlands, as well as the related increase in methylmercury in the food web.

I’m asking DNR to stop the EIS process until Talon provides information on mineral reserves and a realistic project plan. Don’t allow a bait-and-switch on Minnesota.

—Analyze Talon’s ore and waste processing and tailings disposal alternatives. Are they real? What effects would they cause in their transportation, and if they turn out to be unprofitable and assets must be stranded here in Minnesota?

[ I'd add to this now, knowing that the preferred route for transporting all this highly-reactive ore to Michigan is through the Twin Ports and on a Laker across Lake Superior ... They really need to reopen the comment and schedule another public hearing in Duluth ]

—Tell the truth about dewatering of wetlands and groundwater and the effects on Talon mine drawdown on wild rice abundance and mercury contamination of fish.
Would Tribes and local fishing economies be harmed? How about our children who eat fish?

—Require a Health Risk Assessment that includes all the ways in which Talon mine pollution can harm workers and residents, and a Health Impact Assessment that considers nutrition, Tribal culture, and the effects of boom and bust mining on local communities.

—Evaluate the No Action/No Mining alternative that includes 100% metals recycling and how much money taxpayers would save if no more Talon subsidies were paid out.

Thank you for considering my comments and making changes needed to protect Minnesota’s natural resources, health, and the integrity of EIS environmental review.

Sincerely,
Shanai Matteson

Above: Talon Sumps in 2023.
Below: Same site in 2026.
Above: Image taken in 2023 after a Talon Metals drill has been moved.
Below: Images of three Talon drills in spring of 2026.
Attached: Reports, Letter from MDH about Rio Tinto and Talon.

Risks of Copper-Nickel Sulfide Mining Are Not Acceptable Anywhere – No waters in Minnesota should be considered sacrifice zones.

The Governor choosing to protect the Boundary Waters was bittersweet. It was sweet to hear that the state is moving towards protecting the waters that connect so many to wilderness. But it was also bitter. In protecting the Boundary Waters, the state acknowledged that copper-nickel sulfide mining is too big a threat to even consider in one portion of our state. Yet the fact that the order could have included other areas under threat, but didn’t, hit hard, especially for Native and local communities who bear the greatest risks from this new type of mining here in our region.

The Boundary Waters are worth protecting; this is important. They are part of Anishinaabeg treaty territory, a tourism hotspot, and a national treasure; so of course, I am grateful to Walz for standing up for our state and shared waters.

Yet the proposed Rio Tinto-Talon mine is steps ahead of Twin Metals, is located in the wettest place a mine like this has ever been proposed, and is located directly in the Mississippi River Watershed. The PolyMet project, now known as New Range, is back on the table and threatens the St. Louis River, which flows right into Lake Superior. The Mississippi provides drinking water to millions of people downstream, and Lake Superior holds ten percent of the world’s freshwater. If copper-nickel sulfide mining is too dangerous in one place, why can’t we recognize that it’s too dangerous anywhere in our water-rich environment? With this order, the Governor and Minnesota DNR are saying we will protect one place, but the others can be sacrificed for the profits of International mining corporations.

To the people who say that Minnesota can pursue copper-nickel mining in areas where risks are “acceptable,” you need to ask yourself:

What qualifies these other areas as acceptable? Is it because they are poor communities, where our representatives all parrot mining company talking points? Or because they are right next to Native reservations? Is it because people with brown skin live next to these proposed mines? This screams environmental racism, and the state of Minnesota is enabling it.

The proposed Talon mine is only 1.3 miles away from Anshinaabeg homes, and is in an area that holds some of the best wild rice beds in the world. It is also home to wetlands and globally-rare peat bogs that filter water and store carbon. The areas under threat from copper-nickel mining are the forever homes of the Anishinaabeg and they are not “acceptable risks”!

All of our shared waters deserve protections from copper-nickel sulfide mining, and from the dangers posed by water-hungry hyper-scale data centers. Governor Walz has an opportunity to leave behind a beautiful legacy that shows he stands with all of our communities all across the state who are fighting hard for our waters. I hope that in his time left in office he does just that. This one executive order is a good first step, but there is much more work that needs to be done.

Note: This piece was written by Anishinaabe & frontline community members and submitted to the Star Tribune, but it doesn’t seem like they will publish it, so am sharing it here.

Pictured: Lake Minnewawa in Aitkin County x Wildflower Group media collective.

I sat down recently with jazz musician Sam Miletich to talk about his new ensemble project, Miletici. We recorded our conversation and you can listen here to get a preview of Sam’s upcoming shows: https://on.soundcloud.com/AnJanq2yhxynhzA2fO

Though we got together to talk about art and music, we ended up talking about a lot of other things ... including what’s happening now with ICE in Minnesota .... and our own family stories of migration, land, and culture -- as well as something we don’t talk about much in our places, which is generational trauma and what it has meant for people living on the Iron Range.

If you’re interested in this kind of arts and culture conversation - you can join Fire in the Village and our local partners for these kind of music and community events.

This concert with Sam and Matthew Miltich as Miletići was on Saturday, February 21st at Sampaguita in Aitkin, with support from Ripple River Gallery and our Fire in the Village community.

I’ve always thought of that as the stuff with a little bite, some gritty or heartbreaking story, not just cliches and product placements.

Today a lot of what poses as “Country” is corporate propaganda, selling us trucks, beer, fishing gear, fashion brands, gender politics, and a lifestyle of rural consumption peppered with patriotism and resentment … which tend to align with right-wing nationalism and right-wing christian fascism.

To my surprise, I learned that country artist Zach Bryan is releasing a song that’s making some of those same folks folks mad, cause it signals disenchantment with these sensibilities, and probably most significantly, an acknowledgment of the fading of any illusion to America’s supposed greatness.

Some are calling this an “Anti-ICE” song, I don’t know if I’d agree with that — since just expressing a feeling about something isn’t really activism.

I think one of the things about the song that’s interesting is that it’s almost ambiguous, like he’s talking about the experience of an occupation, but in a way that seems almost universal for poor or working-class people living in an America where poverty is punished and criminalized. It’s hard to see this as a political argument, so it’s more of a genuine human note about a particular place in this fucked-up hierarchy.

And that’s important too. We make sense of these things together, that’s one of the ways that art metabolizes trauma, helps us connect and heal, and remember our power.

Anyone here know any other newish movement or political songs?

Particularly anti-fascist songs, or songs that have solidarity themes or that convey this moment?

Any genre, I’m just interested in listening.

Listen to the full track, ‘Bad News’ by Zach Bryan.

I wrote this piece in summer of 2019, about 6 years ago. I found the text in my phone's “notes” app, which is where I often put down my thoughts, most of the time just for me, Dear Diary.

Or maybe it was the start of one of those long-winded Facebook posts I share and then regret sharing, which are actually personal essays I never even try to publish. It’s so strange to read this now, and to realize it was not long ago at all, and yet it seems so distant.

Before the pandemic,
the uprising,
the pipeline,
the insurrection.
Before attempts and
political assassinations.
How many mass shootings?
Before this one,
when my own babies were so much smaller.

I read it now, and it gets me thinking about the places between, and how I am still struggling to understand this, and what it means to be here, to be anywhere.

I’m sharing this all these years later, not because I think it’s profound — I cringe at how naive I sound. I’m sharing because it reminds me of some things I need to remember right now.

* * *

THIS PLACE IN BETWEEN

Last week on a bike trip across the Iron Range, my friends and I stopped at a tiny bar to wait out a storm that was heading our way. The weather service said to expect golf ball-sized hail and 60 mile-per-hour winds, so we decided to take a break. It was a Monday afternoon, and town was quiet. The bar was the only place that seemed to be open.

We ordered a round of beers, and the bartender was friendly. After we exchanged a few stories, I asked if he was "from here" - a question that always gets asked of me, and one I know carries more weight than most people assume.

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If someone tells you they're "from here,” the next question is usually, "Which town?" or "Which family?"

This is a way people place you in the landscape as they understand it, “Who are your people?" and ”What do you want?”

///

He explained that yes, he was born in Hoyt Lakes. He lived in the Cities for awhile, but didn't like it all that much.

"Too many people."

He’d moved back to the Iron Range a decade ago, to be near his family. He decided to buy the bar because bars are important places to gather with community. He was the owner, and the only employee on duty.

///

When he said he was from Hoyt Lakes, I had to ask,

“Isn’t that where they want to put the new copper mine? How do you feel about it?”

///

I'm genuinely curious about people and their feelings as they face the future. Especially the future of water, climate change, economy, and racial and economic equity.

I care deeply about what's happening in all of these spheres, and I have commitments, but these are not things I am interested in debating.

I think that's one of the reasons people will often share their thoughts with me when I ask.

They can tell I don’t want to argue or judge them.

When we're human, and up front about our motivations, we can better read each other. It’s been my experience that most people can sense when curiosity and care are personal, and they will take more risk in revealing themselves - even when they know the person they’re speaking with disagrees or sees the world in a different way.

That’s the place I come from.

///

I'm grateful for the people on the front lines of the most important movements of our time - those relentlessly advocating, agitating, litigating, carriers of critical information and experience.

But I’m a writer and an artist, not really an activist.

No matter what I’m doing, I'm just gathering impressions … shaping them into ideas … working through what I hear and see toward what I can envision.

I’m never satisfied with simple answers, black and white issues, or the stories at the surface.

My goal is never to try to convince someone of something I believe, only to understand better who they are and why they believe what they do … Which is also a good way to meet people where they are on important topics.

///

How are decisions - from day-to-day life choices, to public policy - actively shaped by experience, and the narratives we're living within?

What are the stories we tell, or don't - and why does it matter?

How are public campaigns for and against controversial developments or changes a part of that shaping?

What is it about identity that narrows or expands our field of vision… Who do we believe we are, and what do we fear we will become or lose?

These are the things I puzzle over.

///

I don’t think I can do much on my own to avert a disaster like the Polymet mine.

But I can listen, take notes, reflect on all that I’m hearing, speak up, and wherever possible, try to plant and nourish seeds.

///

A seed could be another way of thinking, or it can be a different way of relating to other people.

It could be the spark of an idea, or a dormant memory.

It could be a literal seed that I plant, or a stitch.

Whatever the case, it will stand a better chance of growing into something significant, if it’s sown into healthy soil.

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Most of the time, I'm listening so that I can take what I hear with me to prepare and tend the next place(s) I go — to nourish, or to tend.

///

The bartender answered my question about the copper mine and his feelings:

"I'm okay with it. We need jobs. I mean, you've been biking through here all week… Did you look around?!”

"People down there (meaning people like me, in the Twin Cities) bitch about how the mine is gonna pollute the water... But whose water? Don’t they know we have clean water here, and we've been mining for awhile?"

"They have such good technology and filters now, the water will probably be even cleaner than when they start!”

"Have you seen how they do mining in other countries? Are you OK with that?”

“At least here we have environmental standards.“

///

Here's a few things I glean from this, and some questions that I'll be bringing back into the community art spaces I'm creating with partners over the coming months:

— People understand that the economic future of places like the Iron Range are in question, and they seem to assume that "jobs" (or at least "good jobs") are masculine / industrial / extractive… Jobs in service, healthcare, tourism, or other industries that are about care or hospitality (“women’s work”) are not "good jobs” — even if they pay well.

Why is that? Whose lives and livelihoods are these “good jobs" sustaining? And at what cost or risk to whose public and ecosystem health?

— The "rural - urban divide" here seems to be all about land use, who decides and who benefits (which is what it's all about, but we're far past forgetting that) much more than they are about culture, but culture is being used like a bludgeon to deepen difference and distrust … Our Way of Life.

This is where politics and culture intertwine: Any effort to build a broad movement across difference (that protects water, safeguards public health, and advances economic justice) will have to account for the ways that water, land, and ideas of "wildness" and "work" are always raced and classed and cultured … Just like our advocacy efforts.

— Is wilderness or water for recreation, or for work? What kind? Who says? Can it be both? Can we imagine beyond these dominant relationships and dichotomies? How else does a place sustain people, and vice versa? What is absolutely necessary?

— A lot of people believe the arguments about the safety protocols of corporations, the progress of “clean” technology, the abundance (and therefore unchangeable fact) of clean water, and the exceptionalism of Minnesota's regulatory process... Even though there are all kinds of examples that contradict this in reality.

— Corporate paternalism ("mining supports us") still has a grip here unlike other places I've been, and the local political and cultural landscape is a microcosm of a global process. I don't know how you untangle this, and frankly, this is where my heart breaks.

—In my efforts to muck in (which are limited to art-making and cultural organizing) I’m choosing to forefront all the other people and processes (beyond just jobs and money) that really do sustain life … life-giving relationships like the maintaining of clean water / care when we're hurt or sick / restorative ecology / the cultivation of healthy food and landscapes / community and spiritual life…

—These are not oppositional practices, they are alternative ways of imagining ourselves in place that are already a reality.

—None of us are outside of these issues, we are all implicated. As people who live in Minnesota, who consume energy and technology, who live in this moment - we have to grapple with the truth that we continue to permit economic development that makes extraction of resources and labor from Indigenous/ rural lands and communities (and other historically marginalized people and places) seemingly inevitable.

—I say 'seemingly' because there are other ways of imagining, creating, and living with and in place.*

—At the root of all of this is a dominant system (and culture) that sees land, water, labor, creativity… All as resources to be extracted, managed, developed, fought over...

— I think the shift that could make that most significant difference would be aimed at destabilizing that foundation by any and all means possible.

—This might mean refusing to "fight" along pre-determined lines, and instead, move energy inward and downward… Preparing the grounds and planting the seeds of new thinking and being, nourishing connections that promote widespread awaking to interdependent relationships as the basis of our lives and our economy.

—Many of us are excluded from "owning" or "controlling" the resources we would need to make big changes, but each one of us has the power to create healthier and more reciprocal relationships.

—This is not a top-down project, nor is it a quick fix, but this is a good thing! It means we don't have to wait for an election, or a grant, or a permit to get started on this important work.

—We do have to be willing to tell the truth about the past (how did we get here, each of us… what was done to make this possible… And what what are we doing to repair) … And we have to get comfortable with the uncertainty that comes when we stop defaulting to dominance, comfort, and control.

///

— This is all something Indigenous people, who have been inhabiting this place for much longer than most of us who say we are not (or are) "from here," have been demonstrating for generations. Decolonization is not a metaphor, it is imperative.

— And this is why I believe we need to make support for Indigenous resurgence a core part of any proposals for new economic, environmental, or cultural policies (which are sisters, not sectors).

///

*This is what I'm most interested in now — and where I hope to take my cultural organizing work in the future.

How do we go from identifying these patterns, to collectively creating other ways of thinking, making, and living — and how do we do it in the midst of violence, climate chaos, and the breakdown of other relationships and systems and governments?

///

Back at the bar, the big storm never arrived.

Our bartender explained that the massive mine pit lake that sits at the center of a cluster of small mining towns — the pit dug by the last round of corporations who came through with “jobs” and left a busted economy and a giant hole in the ground — actually alters the weather.

“People call this ‘The Place in Between’ — I think that’s actually what the native name for this place translates to. It creates its own weather.”

As a poet, of course I was hooked on this line.

I asked him, “What do you mean, it creates its own weather?”

“I don’t know if it’s the cold water in the pit lake, or the massive tailings piles … But storms will be coming straight for us, and then they will just disappear over Nashwauk.”

“Like a heat island?”

“Yes, but in reverse.”

I didn't make it to any of the big ‘hands-off’ rallies on Saturday, or the small ones.

The arts and culture collective I help to lead, Fire in the Village, was hosting a two day gathering mitigoog (Among the Trees) at Long Lake Conservation Center in my hometown of Palisade — learning or teaching about iskigamiziga or sugar bush camp.

We had about 40 young people come up north from a college in St. Paul, and a handful of middle and high school students join us from nearby public schools.

In the future, we’d love to support more middle and high school students from surrounding Native and rural communities to join. I think that exchange of experience between college students from all over the world, and youth from our region would be so powerful.

Annie and her daughter Kwe shared about their family's sugar bush - helping us all understand that for Anishinaabeg, this yearly tradition is about so much more than just gathering sap and making maple syrup. Annie's grandson's joined in on the music she shared, and they read poetry.

All our kids helped out, and that was a fun thing to see too. My daughter loved talking to the college students about life in third grade.

On Saturday, we had a handful of friends from nearby lead hands-on activities indoors and out. These were slow spaces for learning and connecting while doing something nourishing, and that made lots of room for open-ended conversation inspired by the stories we'd heard from Annie and family the day before.

I learned that many students on college campuses - especially international students - are feeling very scared right now, as the Trump administration cracks down on student activism, suppressing free speech and arresting or deporting political opponents of the United States government.

This isn't stopping young people from organizing in resistance, but it has a chilling effect. Many of them spoke about disappointment in college administrations and in current political leadership, who they felt were complying in advance with the Trump regime, and not appreciating how pivotal this moment is for our whole world.

I got the sense that a couple of days in the woods with powerful and grounded Anishinaabe and rural women was something that they appreciated — a chance to be among the trees. A few of them spoke about how this experience made them feel homesick for their own families and beloved places, but some of them couldn't go home, because if they did, they might not be allowed to return to finish school.

We talked about this while we drank tea and stitched tiny Fire in the Village patches.

I shared a little bit about my own personal experience with home, and with the housing crisis in our region, and housing insecurity.

We live in the land of 10,000 lakeshore cabins most of us can't afford ... beautiful places among the trees that sit empty most of the year. Yet so many of us struggle to find and maintain safe and secure housing here in communities where our families have been for generations.

I’ve recently been dealing with this again, after finally finding a place the kids and I can live, and it’s bringing up a lot of buried memories from my childhood, times when our family was homeless, though we rarely called it that.

When people talk about "what holds us back" here in this rural region, economically and politically, they talk about “jobs” but they don’t talk about homes very much, or the growing disparities between the comfortable (who are mostly urban folks visiting our region) and those working class and poor people who fight to stay in this place that we love, even though it breaks our hearts sometimes.

A lot of the people who struggle most are single women with kids. I sometimes worry about what I am putting my own kids through, but then I remember that we have maple trees here, and a few white pine trees (though many of them were cut down generations ago), clean water (though that is also changing), and a sky full of stars, and we have relatives and neighbors who can teach us things we need to know about how to survive in the midst of chaos and uncertainty.

Our friend Lynn Mizner from Chengwatana Community Farm led students in a canning demonstration. They made chokecherry jam and talked about what food security means in a place of abundance, where a lot of people are eating food that is making them sick, because access to land and land-based knowledge are critical — and we’ve lost a lot of it.

Students learned to make medicine from plants, tried swamp tea and white pine and chaga, carved sumac spiles with Leanna and learned about her work on wild rice protection, made simple birchbark baskets, carved their own block prints and made patches, tried embroidery and each and every piece they made was unique .... They also got to wander around in the woods, gather around fires, talk with some of the naturalists at long lake about bogs and lichens and the wonders of wetlands.

Some of them took their art projects to the lake.

I just wanted to share a few notes and photos from the weekend because I think in a moment of so much righteous anger, this is also how we resist.

It's slow, and it's quiet, and we don't always take the lead or put our own voices front and center, but like Annie says, revolution can be quietly preparing for what's coming, whatever that is.

#smallfireseverywhere

So here's a piece that I made that was part of a textile art exhibition Katya Oicherman curated at the Minnesota Museum of American Art called Im/Perfect Slumbers:

This piece is a deconstructed quilt I titled "Severed Right" ... in reference to the severing of mineral rights from surface land rights that happens here in Minnesota. This makes it possible for our Minnesota DNR to sell minerals from beneath our communities to international mining companies — even when exploiting those minerals would put Minnesota’s environment and the health of rural places at risk.

The middle layer of the quilt is a soft wool quilt-batting version of the "Tamerack Intrusive Complex" - which is how geologists with the state of Minnesota refer to the nickel ore body that sits beneath the lakes and rivers, wetlands and manoomin (wild rice) stronghold near Big Sandy Lake, in 1855 & 1854 treaty territory, or Aitkin and Carlton Counties.

I made the piece out of fabric that I dyed with overburden or mining waste I got from taconite mine sites on the Iron Range - and with high-vis safety vests and chiffon that I printed with images inspired by wetland plants and insects I love.

I did an interview with Katya and the M ahead of this exhibition. It’s archived here.

“In the pieces I’m creating, I’m incorporating some of my experience with those materials–minerals, plants–and also with colors and patterns that are part of the work culture that is also present in this place. Things like the clothes people wear in my community when they’re hunting, or working on a pipeline or mineral drilling rig.

I associate certain high visibility colors with labor and with safety. It makes me think about the visibility and invisibility of people, or ways of life–and it makes me wonder what is beneath these ideas? Who has a right to safety, or clean water? And who or what is sacrificed?”

Below is a video recording of artists who were part of this exhibition discussing their work and reading written reflections.

I don’t know if many people understand or care about the difference between organizing and activism, but there are differences.

Both are important and have impact, but failing to do the organizing part, and just doing the activism part—especially just doing it for an audience on social media—can contribute to the indignation that many rural and working class community members have expressed toward progressive politics and the people and groups that are assumed to be the vanguard.

Many activists I’ve met tend to stay in protest mode — that is, taking actions that are aimed at making a point of view heard to those in positions of perceived power and authority, or to other people who might be witnessing the action in person or via social media, rather than actually engaging with communities that are most immediately impacted by the issues that they are protesting.

Where there is lack of relationship or resource for recognizing and building real relationships across differences in experience or perspective—people are more vulnerable to disinformation and divisiveness.

In that case, protest is characterized as performance, and people who have not been engaged might see themselves and their places as merely part of a backdrop.

When everything (voting, the legal system, the economy, even activism) seem like pointless endeavors that don’t change the conditions of peoples lives, more and more people will start cheering for those who break systems or who make it clear where they’re broken.

That’s why I think our organizing and our activism, as well as other types of related education and care-giving work, is more effective when we build real power among people in our communities. We have to not only make it clear where things are broken, but also, what we’re willing to do to repair, and what power we have to make things right or to make things different when we work together.

That’s not power OVER others, and its not just left-right political power. It is power with one another. The ability to act.

Not all power is leveraged to make policy change.

A seemingly small culture shift in the way we engage with one another or with issues can make movements more durable, and more diverse.

And sometimes force is necessary to counter the violence of the state, or to protect people and places from those who use their "power over others" (authority) to suppress their opponents or to manipulate and control.

I’m not advocating for more violence, but I think it’s important to understand power, and that’s what I think is beginning to happen for a lot of people right now … They're getting lessons in that very topic.

Some of them are hard lessons, because they are lived experiences with powerlessness.

What counts as violence? Whose lives are worth grieving? And who decides?

I’m republishing some of my posts from other platforms here, the ones that generated thoughtful conversation. The image is from a drawing my child made while friends were making cardboard armor and acting out epic battles. She said it shows her ‘killing the black snake’ and that I’m on the right, singing, while I fend off cops with a cardboard sword.

Some people are shocked that Luigi Mangione went to McDonald's... But in some places, McDonald's is the only wi-fi you can access.

In some places, McDonald's is the only place you can stay warm for the price of a cup of coffee.

It's interesting how people cheering for "greater class consciousness" and "solidarity among the working class" find all these low-key ways to slam poor people for their choices, or to throw poor communities under the bus — especially those who might live in "red" rural places.

I was hanging around Palisade & Aitkin this weekend, which is about as "red" and as rural as places get in Minnesota. We are technically a Frontier County - which you can look up on the internet.

I went to a really nice craft sale at The Rustic Trail, sold some jewelry I made out of fishing lures, and I talked to the people there about doing some art and craft workshops this winter.

They've already been doing these here, which is awesome - and the women I talked to this weekend wanted to learn about printmaking. As a teaching artist, it makes me so happy when people want to try a new art forms like that ~ hit me up anytime if that's you!

While I was going around, visiting, I also talked to a number of people about politics and things that are happening in the world and close to home.

Mostly what we talked about was stuff close to home. There is plenty of crazy shit going on around here, but I was surprised how many people said, in different ways:

'That CEO had it coming, though!'

Some of them just resent rich people, and I can understand that sentiment, but I think some of them were also saying, 'We're suffering. We know who's responsible, and who's benefiting.'

Tonight, at Community Night, I acknowledged my Dad's upcoming birthday and we sang him a song.

I put letter-shaped that spelled out HAPPY DAY in the Peach Cobbler I got from WalMart (it was not very good, but it’s what I had time and money to get today) - leaving out the BIRTH part because the cobbler pan was too small for the whole word BIRTHDAY, and because I figured maybe we could use the remaining BIRTH candles for another celebration, on another day?

There was talk of the epidemic of loneliness, and the isolation we feel here in rural Minnesota.

As people were trickling in with their crockpots, I was helping with a website for a local community group I'm a part of here, and as we filled in some of the details under the section: ABOUT AITKIN COUNTY, we had to acknowledge that poverty and lack of access to healthcare, affordable housing, community spaces.... these are all part of what we know to be a feature of our geography, and this compounds hard shit many of us have experienced firsthand, for decades if not our whole lives.

This isn't an endorsement, or even hot take about Luigi Mangione — who some folks online are calling THE ADJUSTER — it's just a weird time to be living through as a thinking and feeling person.

I know I'm not alone in sensing those contradictions and complexities, as well as some of the very simple solutions to the problems we have a hard time naming.

To gather.

That's why.

I got a message from a community member who was at our monthly potluck late this evening, and among other things she offered, was the idea that we should have some kind of chalkboard or space that everyone on main street can see where we might dare to ask ourselves and others this question,

"What do people here really need?"

“We Will Not Give up Jadar!”

Voices of resistance from Serbia's Jadar River valley

This is a very basic map that was created by Stella Theodore and the Wildflower Group, a media collective I am a part of, with links to articles and to video interviews gathered on a trip that a group of us took to Serbia earlier this year.

We met with communities that are also facing mining proposals by Rio Tinto (here they call themselves Talon Metals, but they are in fact Rio Tinto) to mine lithium from Serbia’s fertile Jadar Valley.

Like nickel, lithium is considered an energy transition mineral that is part of some electric vehicle batteries.

It was interesting to hear some of the same experiences in this Serbian village as we've heard from people who live in and around Tamarack and other mining hot spots in our region. Connecting across the globe around shared concerns, and recognizing the company playbook, felt empowering.

Since we took this trip & created this quick story map, there have been developments on the ground in Serbia - notably the effort to restart the mining project under considerable pressure from EU countries:

"If implemented, Rio Tinto's Jadar project could meet 90% of Europe’s current lithium needs, positioning the company as one of the world’s leading lithium producers. The environmentalists and a majority of opposition parties argue that the mine could pollute land and water in the area, impacting farming, a major source of income for many in the region. 'There’s no retreat or surrender. They will not ravage nature and our lives,' said Branka Petrovic, 47, an activist from Belgrade. Serbian officials argue that the mine will boost the country's economy. In June, Serbia's President Aleksandar Vucic said mining could start as early as 2028." - Reuters

Here is a video I took with my cellphone of community members in one of the villages nearest to the proposed mine:

They show us what the mining company does to the houses here - and what this does to the people who continue to try to resist by living where they have for generations.

Rio Tinto and the European Union want the lithium for electric vehicles that will be made and sold to western Europeans. According to activists on the ground in Serbia and documents leaked from negotiations, they are pressuring Serbia to mine as a condition of ascension into the EU, but the Serbians who live here say they don't want to be a mining colony so that western Europe can have its "green energy" ... Sounds a little bit familiar, doesn’t it?

Listen to the Conversation Here

Last week I brought the Talon Mine Tours project to the Twin Cities for the first time, and we took a little group to visit the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources headquarters in St. Paul.

MN DNR is the "responsible government unit" that is overseeing the exploratory drilling and mine permitting process for Rio Tinto and Talon Metals' nickel mining district here in 1855 Treaty Territory, or rural Aitkin County.

We were not disruptive - just there sharing information we've been gathering ... but we piqued the interest of building security, who came down to ask us what was happening.

It was a friendly exchange.

I told them what I tell everyone on these tours, "I'm the owner of a mine tour company, and the DNR is part of our public education tour."

"You’re the owner of a mining company?"

"No, a MINE TOUR COMPANY, Talon Mine Tours.” I handed him a postcard, “We offer free tours of the Talon Mine, which doesn't exist in Aitkin County, where we're based. Have you been there?"

He asked for extra copies of our postcards and brochures, and then stared at them with a puzzled look on his face.

"You know, we thought you might be here to do a demonstration, like a sit in... but you have the work vests on.”

“Yes, we are working right now!” I told him.

“The vests are kind of scary ...” He laughed uncomfortably, like it was hard to admit he was afraid of us. “I mean… Like is this an emergency? You see vests like that and you think emergency."

"Oh, my gosh! I didn't realize a bunch of people in high vis vests poking around your place, without telling you why ... Is scary?” I told him. “I guess that's how some people feel when the mining companies come to our little towns ... All these high vis vests and we don't know what they're doing here, but it doesn’t look good."

"Did you let someone know you were coming? Do you have contacts at the DNR?"

"We've met with the DNR lots of times, they tell us to let the process play out, and it will be fair ... But we also see that the mining company is working with paid consultants who used to work for our government agencies, and now the government agencies are hiring people directly from the mining company ... So we're just here to look around and pose some questions."

"If you're gonna keep doing this, you need to tell us when you're coming. You can’t just show up and you can’t come inside.... This isn't public space."

"But you're a public agency?"

"This is a private building."

"How about the gift shop? That looks welcoming. Can we go in there if we are just public and not people who own a multibillion dollar mining company?"

"Sure - you can go in the gift shop."

"We have a gift shop too! And bumper stickers. We'll leave some here and we won't even charge you."

I’m in a lot of conversations lately about politics and organizing, and one thing I've noticed is that a lot of people seem to be confusing "messaging" with actually doing the work of organizing in their communities.

They confuse performing politics, with doing politics.

You can host all the focus groups and do all the research, run numbers and hire consultants to tell you what people think and which messages will work. And if you're a political party or a campaign or an organization that is building a network, you can probably find people who will represent your messages to folks you don't really know.

But if you're not actually in community building relationships, in a sustained way — listening, meeting needs where you can, or helping to connect people, organize money, or develop ideas into collective actions — then you are just a marketing representative for someone with power who is trying to sell the idea that they should keep it to people who might feel they don't have any.

Most people know when an organization or leader is not really interested in them forming ideas about issues or finding their own solutions. You just want their vote, their signature, their story, or their time.

People can smell bullshit, and it’s nonpartisan.

In other words, there are no shortcuts. You can't message your way out of a relational problem.

I’m republishing some of my posts from other platforms here, the ones that generated thoughtful conversation. The image is from a zine my child made in answer to a question at school about ‘what they want to be.’ It has nothing to do with this post I just like it.