“I am more here than I ever was before. I am more with you than I ever could have imagined.” — Poet Andrea Gibson (1975-2025)

I had the privilege of being among a small group attending the Minidoka Pilgrimage granted permission to witness the lighting of the Wakasa Spirit Stone on the very ground on which ur ancestors were buried. Its well-traveled base had already gathered hallowed dust and dirt on its journey from former sites at Topaz, Tule Lake, and Manzanar, and now made its way to the area that once served as the Minidoka cemetery. In uniting with sacred land, the lantern that held our history was creating new memories.

Driving over bumpy dirt and narrow mud-filled roads, we finally arrived in the vicinity where the cemetery was thought to be — now a vast field of towering corn stalks as far as the eye could see. Setting up the large lantern surrounded by smaller lanterns and engulfed by corn stalks was a five-man team led by the creative partnership of activist/creator Nancy Ukai and artist/filmmaker Glenn Mitsui. It was Glenn’s idea to project words and moving pictures with music onto the paper lantern, thus giving art and life to the Spirit Stone and allowing us to see and feel the everlasting presence of our once silenced ancestors.

As the lantern glowed in the darkness and the late jazz musician Mark Izu’s music played, we experienced the profundity of creative memory and the power of place. Voices echoed through the forsaken earth upon which our Japanese American ancestors were forced to endure. As we stood fixated on this simple washi paper-covered lantern that embodied their spirit, poet Brandon Shimoda’s words blazed across it: “Their names have faded. Their presence has not. We come together to console their spirit and illuminate their presence with our own.”

It was as if we were joined with them and them with us as well as with one another. Mitsui articulated the unspoken feeling, “When we remember together, we heal together.”

The Wakasa Spirit Stone will hopefully continue to heal and unite us as it travels across other consecrated ground to educate people about the injustices of the past and remind survivors and descendants that our ancestors will forever be with us.

Sharon Yamato is a writer/journalist, former TV producer, and independent filmmaker whose work focuses on the Japanese American experience. The views expressed in the preceding commentary are not necessarily those of the Nichi Bei News.