14 year old Emily Pike loved cats. She was a member of the San Carlos Apache Nation. Emily went missing in late January 2025. She was brutally murdered. Her remains were found in February.
In March COFA* members joined vigils on the Yaqui & Tohono O’odham and on the San Carlos Apache Nation (both in land claimed by Arizona). We walked with hundreds. We held candles and prayed. We replied to the call, “Say her name!” with a resounding “Emily Pike!”
Many at these vigils wore red. Many held a poster of a bright red traditional camp dress across which Emily’s name and 4 crosses were printed. Red dresses are a symbol of the fight to end the genocidal ongoing targeting of indigenous women with violence: Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW).
It was chilling to look around the crowd and see women and girls holding this poster, because it appears that the one holding the poster is in the dress with the name tag “Emily Pike.” The message echoed; it could have been me. It could be me. It could be any of us. It could be you.
They came for the land and indigenous people were in the way. My people not only didn’t stand up against the genocide, but gratefully received the land so murderously stolen.
Attempts at genocide have not ended. They come for indigenous women and girls. They come for the heart of the family, the community, the tribe. They come for the ones who can bring new life forth. They come for indigenous women and girls. Who will stand up?
After the vigils we went back to Oak Flat, a female place, where streams nurture life. Where manzanita berries are red and burst sweet in your mouth. Where ancient oaks lift arms to host birds, so full of songs that they pull the sun over the horizon in the morning. A rainbow in flight; mountain blue birds flash, pairs of raven black croak, gold finches flit, and cardinals in the red of those many dresses bring us back to the way genocide threatens all that is indigenous and ready to bring forth life… Women, girls, Mother Earth herself.
The threat of murder shadows these days. For your Oak Flat prayer today, join in the chant;
Say, “No more missing and murdered indigenous women and girls!” Say her name: “Emily Pike!”
With awe and determination, with the power of prayer, knowing that the indigenous women, the girls, and the land are one… and that as they go, we all go. Say her name: “Nagosan!” (Apache for mother earth)
*COFA: Chi’chil Biłdagoteel Oak Flat Accompaniment is a working group of the Coalition to Dismantle the Doctrine of Discovery
Carol Rose is a pastor, sometimes a poet, always one to delight in earth. This former director of CPT is a longtime worker for a just peace that dismantles colonialism inside of us and in the structures that hold it in place. Carol is a member of the Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery Coalition and leader of the Coalition’s Protect Oak Flat Campaign that follows the lead of the Apache Stronghold. She lives on Tohono O’odham land in the verdant Sonoran desert city of Tucson, Arizona.
2 Responses
“The Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women held a candlelight vigil and honor song to remember Emily Pike and the missing and murdered Indigenous women and relatives of New Mexico last Friday (March 28) at the 4-H Park in Albuquerque, NM. The 4-H Park is the site of the cemetery for the former Albuquerque Indian School. NM Senator Angel Charley asked those present to contact Gov. Lujan Grisham and request that she sign SB 41, an act to create a turquoise alert system for missing Indigenous people in New Mexico, which has passed the NM legislature. There will be another MMIW event at the Santa Fe Plaza on May 4, which is Red Dress Sunday.”
We in Olympia have this and murdered and missing women in the for front