Gatherings Volume XI The En'owkin Journal of First North American Peoples Flight Scape: a multi-directional collection of Indigenous creative works Fall 2000 ,; I RECEIVED MAR 2 6 2001 S.f.U. LIBRARY SERIALS edited by Florene Belmore Theytus Books Ltd. Penticton, BC Gatherings The En'owkin Journal of First North American Peoples Volume XI 2000 Table of Contents Editor's Note I 7 Copyright © 2000 for the authors Annand Garnet Ruffo Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Main entry under title: Gatherings Blueberries I 9 Detour I 11 Prayer/ 13 Now that the Galleons have Landed/ 14 Carol Snow Moon Bachofner Burial Dress / 16 Lost and Found In My Own Life / 17 Annual. ISSN 1180-0666 Dawn Dumont ISBN 0-919441-93-9 1. Canadian literature (English)--Indian authors--Periodicals. * 2. Canadian literature (English)--20th century--Periodicals. * 3 American literature--Indian authors--Periodicals. 4. American literature--20th century--Periodicals. I. En'owkin International School of Writing. II. En'owkin Centre. PS8235.I6G35 C810.8'0897 CS91-031483-7 PR9194.5.I5G35 Fancy Dancer/ 18 Love Story I 19 The Right Thing I 21 Untitled/ 23 Message from the Conqueror / 24 Eric A. Ostrowidzki Banana-Rama-Shama / 25 Gerry William Editor: Cover Art: Design & Layout: Florene Belmore Margaret Orr Florene Belmore Please send submissions and letters to Gatherings, En'owkin Centre, R.R.2, Site 50, Comp. 8, Penticton, BC, V2A 6J7, Canada Previously published works are not considered. The publisher acknowledges the support of the Canada Council, Department of Canadian Heritage and the British Columbia Arts Council in the publication of this book. Fever/ 29 Jane Inyallie Belinda The Biker/ 37 ironhorse I 38 the forgotten son / 40 the line/ 43 Gordon Bird Terminal Frost 1. / 44 Terminal Frost 2. / 45 Terminal Frost 3. / 46 Terminal Frost 4. / 47 Table of Contents Jack D. Forbes New Age of Circuses / 48 Picasso's Fall/ 52 Women Made of Earth and Honey/ 54 Rosemary White Shield Burying My Mother/ 61 My Answer to the Professor Who Said I Should Write More Like a Man to Be Any Good / 62 On Trying to Make Chit Chat at Dinner / 63 Zuya Wiyan / 64 Nagi Zuya Mani / 65 James Colbert Thrown Away/ 67 Janet Rogers Magic Carpets / 71 No Reservation / 72 Kim Shuck Because the Feet of Four Indian Women Might Change the Weather on the East Coast/ 74 Some Things I Know About Love that Might be of Some Use / 75 Home Songs / 77 Larry Nicholson Residing Poem / 79 Steal My Thunder/ 82 coyote dreamz & rocks / 83 Leanne Flett Kruger Identity Crisis / 85 I Know Who I Am / 87 William George Mountain Bedded Rock / 90 My Pledge I 91 Sockeye Salmon Dream / 92 Table of Contents Margaret Orr Life Line / 93 Green Light, Red Light / 96 Trophy Room / 97 Troy Hunter Geronimo's Grave/ 99 White Picket Fences / 100 Vera Manuel Abused Mothers Wounded Fathers/ 101 Linda LeGarde Grover Anishinaabikwe-Everywoman / 103 Chi-Ko-ko-koho and the Boarding School Prefect, 1934 / 104 Grandmother at Mission School / 106 To the Woman Who Just Bought That Set of Native American Spirituality Dream Intrepretation Cards/ 108 Winona Conceives the Trickster/ 110 Laura A. Marsden Dispelling the Myth of STONEFACE / 111 Marijo Moore Daughter of the Sun / 113 Rasunah Marsden The Cunning of Men/ 116 Yellow Leaves/ 120 Richard Van Camp The Night Charles Bukowski Died/ 121 Suzanne Rancourt Honour Song/ 127 Crooked Nose/ 128 Sipping / 131 Throwing Stars / 134 The Viewing / 136 win blevins Respect/ 139 Table of Contents Amy-Jo Setka Gatherings Volume XI Editor's Note Watersong / 145 Shirley Brozzo We Have Walked The Same Places/ 146 The Voice of the Elders / 149 Mukwa I 151 How The Beaver Got His Tail / 155 Vera M. Wabegijig Truth and Dare ask Raven "The Big Question"/ 157 Selina Hanuse Chasing the Dragon/ 161 Just Around the Eyes/ 163 My Mornings / 164 The Room / 165 To be a Child when it Snows / 166 Twelfth Christmas / 167 Vanessa Nelson Horror Hill / 168 Kayenderes "So Yous Wount Be Put Away" I 173 D. Lynn Daniels After celebrating ten years of Gatherings last year, it is an honour and a pleasure to edit the first volume of the second decade of Gatherings: The En 'owkin Journal of First North American Peoples. As an Aboriginal publishing house dedicated to Aboriginal Literatures, Theytus Books is also proud to bring the publication of the only annual literary journal for Aboriginal voices into a new era. In this eleventh volume, we have sought submissions under the theme "Flight Scape: Amulti-directional collection of Indigenous creative works." In the past year, I have played a lead role in developing the theme, soliciting submissions, reading through the submissions, making the selections, going through the editorial process with the authors, and compiling and producing the Journal. As usual, many other people have also committed their time and talent toward the effort required to publish this journal each year. I'd like to thank Rasunah Marsden for her valuable imput. And of course the staff of the En'owkin Centre, a special thanks to Regina Gabriel. Many thanks also to the Aboriginal authors for having the courage to write and the generosity to share their work. You inspire us all. Marguerite / 175 Dan Ennis The Story of My Childhood Journey In The White Wilderness / 180 Author Notes / 185 I now realize what a monumental task it is for the editors and Theytus Books to publish Gatherings on an annual basis. However, I also understand the importance of publishing a current and vibrant collection of Aboriginal Literatures each year. It is, in a sense, a documentation of our voice that affirms our continuing presence both on the landscape and in the literary world. Aboriginal authors continue to persevere, drawing back on our ancestors and traditions to find a solid foundation, and reaching out into uncharted territory to develop new literary techniques. Florene Belmore 7 Armand Garnet Ruffo Blueberries The end of summer and we pick blue berries, pluck them with delicate precision, open ourselves to the goodness that is theirs drop the offering onto our ready tongue and drift into heavy clouds bringing us to remember friends who move marry make pies and jam they ate as children for their own children, holding to the sweetness they once loved. and divorced that's them too when fingers cramp, stop, mouths close in denial, and the heart's want is replaced by the sickly feeling of having too much too little. But here kneeling in the ruins of stumps as far as the eye can see, we take these berries blue as the new life they are, in gratitude 9 Armand Garnet Ruffo humility, yet lustful for the taking. The dusty logging road at our backs we stand, stretch to leave at day's end and laugh in our full desire all the way home. Armand Garnet Ruffo Detour Once upon a time I rode shotgun for a trickster kind of guy who thought we lived in a western, and it would always stay that way. The Lone Ranger and Tonto riding into the sunset. Both of us wanting to be the Lone Ranger. That's us in the picture he carried around in his head, six years old, leather holsters and cowboy hats. Fringed shirts and moccasins from my auntie. The two of us, into the world the same time, the same neighbourhood, and before long crawling into cars through windows, wrecks with doors wired shut, locked in as we had been from birth. Roaring down the road in one gear. Full speed come what may. I wonder where you are these days last time you were working in a distillery and bought an empty barrel you soaked and let sit later we drank the whiskey water and got piss drunk for old.time's sake talk about a hangover How many times did we make it into town and finish up at the Sportsman's Hotel on some Friday evening. Meeting the folks from up and down the line who would come in and get loosened up. Until we too got bent out of shape and then back into the car and back into the bush. Thought we could live like that forever. Though I remember once looking around at all the boozed up old timers and swearing their end wouldn't be mine. Some weren't even old. Like Terry. When the doctors 10 11 Armand Garnet Ruffo Armand Garnet Ruffo opened him up to stop the hemorrhaging, they took one look and closed him back up again. His stomach looked like a tire blown to hell from all the Aqua Velva and cleaning fluid. Last time we rode together you ended up with a woman you picked up hitchhiking you always had a way with women about the time I decided enough was enough it was time to move on about the time you lost your son Remember? We weren't much older than him when got stuck between those two fence posts. We'd been out raiding gardens for strawberries, your own mother's, which always seemed so absurd because she gave us all we wanted, but I guess you preferred to eat them at night with the earth still clinging. Or was it sitting in front of her with a blank face when she complained about the little devils. We were heading down the lane when a car appeared, and we dashed for a gateway and got jammed together. Like so much that came later, we had to wiggle our way out of that one. Like the time you ran away from home because you had fallen in lust with a girl up the line and were bound to get to her. And me walking the tracks behind you wishing I were fishing. Why I tagged along, I still don't know. Though I suppose for the ride. Always the ride, and a wild one it was, riding high in trickster style. 12 Prayer I placed a braid of sweetgrass on your coffin and sat quietly. Outside the sky was dark, and I wore dark glasses because it was still too bright. At the graveyard the priest blessed your passing. An Anishinaabe Elder appeared, laid down tobacco and spoke in your language. Someone asked me who he was and I answered a part of your life beyond ours. You said you wanted a feast for all your family and friends. My heart split, I dug my fork deep into it and chewed and chewed unable to let go. The old people held my hand and told me stories about you as I prayed for rain. 13 :i Armand Garnet Ruffo Unless serious action is taken few Indigenous languages to Canada will survive in the 21st century. The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples Now that the Galleons have Landed Where are the words of Turtle Island? rooted in earth painted on stone and bark, carved into cedar totems, a thousand year old memory What is left but dream new words written on paper in the smoke prayer in the angry loss in the weak catch emptied and flailing. What is left but to struggle with mouth hooked and discover this tongue 14 Armand Garnet Ruffo fitted perfectly is the sound of a prisoner on a boat bound to wailing death For the ancestors huddled before the story of fire, Nanabush his laughter spilling like his seed blooming into the tikinagan, a baby who sings every syllable of her mother earth (cradleboard) This loss my burden as I gasp to stay the course in this language shoved into my relations and now gathered in my own bundle in my own voice to deafen me. 15 Carol Snow Moon Bachofner Carol Snow Moon Bachofner Burial Dress Carefully Prayerfully Inside, outside Our Ways Lost and Found In My Own Life The questions always came, pouring down in rain or whooshing past me in wind. It was easier to avoid them on perfect blue days, on brilliant sunlit mornings. Sinew sewn of Ash and Fire Old Days But sooner or later the clouds pressed me for answers and I'd retreat into darkness. I had no one to ask in whitened kitchens or on wooden Roman pews. Spirit home I learned to accept the void, tum my eyes inward, travel without a guide. Oh, there were always stories told over some holiday glass, but nothing served serious; Elk skin Doe skin Supple, softened Fore st grown Breath dress Death dress Shell and Bead Fingering Back, forth Gentle sway Platform and Pyre merely wild imaginings of relatives, daft with aged mentality, dismissed in unproved authority. Yet my spirit housed a fire of voices pleading through the storm. Woman's own The answers began without warning in my forty-third year. A slow rain of knowing started. Soon I was riding the river of my own history and ready to meet streams of those before. Fringing Hence-hidden voices cleared the curtain of the wind to reveal sacred word and thought. By flaming night I heard them calling me by a new and familiar name. Together alone of Whitened frays I saw faces peering through the gauze of rain, jowled woman faces laid precisely over my grandmother's face, my mother's face and mine. Indian bones I recognized myself at last. The questions still come. But these days I know where to tum for the answers. I know where to tum. 16 17 Dawn Dumont Dawn Dumont Fancy Dancer Love Story My men have no hold on me they are dreams I left behind they are memories I forget most times no more tears for me She met him on the ball field Strong, tall and straight He threw She caught They knew then you dance, jump into the sky and bend your leg coming down, six feet high and sweaty glistening movement you are free you are the softness in my knees your breath I feel as it leaves your lips and as you dance closer to me my body moves and I am dancing too and you spin and spin away from me leaving only that sexy smile to show you saw the song ends cuz all songs end and I quickly turn awayno more tears for me And then they moved Onto parties and dances Playing pool Friends always around And when they weren't Just the stars And they knew The first time wasn't so bad A push But she held him And calmed him And loved him even more Sometimes she'd complain To him, to friends She'd say I'll leave I'll take the kids I'll go far away And he'd say I'm sorry I love you And cry If you lived there Maybe you know How the next part goes How she falls 18 19 Dawn Dumont Dawn Dumont Out of herself How she bruises In secret places How she learns A careful walk Such an old story Played out so well It was the only one they knew. The Right Thing Good God its horrid and bad just plain sucks for them she says rolling her eyes and squeezing her face together-so narrow and tight skinny slim and white white. She says I want to work in human rights right what's wrong make things right. Right. I watch her make bread kneading the dough bony fists moving on it hard pushing it down pulling it up fitting it into the pan. Racism, sexism, ageism homophobia she spits them out like fire. This same heat I can feel upon my face when she laughs at my ignorance. Later her hand upon my shoulder tell me about your people she says 20 21 ! ' Dawn Dumont I talk openly freeing my stories they enter the air round faces and dimpled smiles bubbling laughter at unkind times. Shaking her head, she says how awful I am going to change things. I am going to make them better. I am going to make them right. Right. 22 Dawn Dumont Untitled Anishinaabe he says and smiles and I smile back we have a secret just me and him on this comer he begs got a styrofoam cup of coins but he starts Monday he says got a job just today where you from, we ask that telling detail he says poormans and I know where that is ka-wa-ca-toose I say-he nods his mother once told him the name we're far from home the green prairies the land of skies the patient wind the biting cold but it seems warmer than here why'd you leave I think but I know his answer is too much like my own to really want to hear dreams are bigger than small reserves and we leave to try them all and sometimeswe end up street comers cold alone and far from home 23 Dawn Dumont Message from the Conqueror At first I conquer you, how does not really matter. I could beat you into the ground, or persuade you to accept my beliefs and values, thus casting aside all that makes you different from me -there are many other ways. Then I take what I need and want whether it is important to you or not, whether it defines your people or not. I do not care. I see only my children, my possessions and my dreams. I cannot see your dreams. I cannot see who you are. Your children, I see, but they just seem dirty to me. When you argue that I have done you wrong, I cannot agree. To me and my kind, it was sympathetic, not cruel. And if cruel, then certainly necessary. True, in my movies I admit you had an Eden but in my courts you were just as mean as me. I did what I did to survive. You argue, you plead, you cry, you throw your hands to the sky-sometimes, in despair, you die. All of that is rather sad. I do sympathize. But when your offer your hand and ask for help--I do not want to respond. With your begging eyes and hopeful smile, I want to cast you down. I want to pretend there is no you, or if there is, then only the clean and whitewashed will I recognize. I do not want to play anymore. I want you just to go away. I do not want to hear your past, that you were victimized-I will not listen to these lies. Let me be. I have things to do. Get on with it-my world has no place for you. 24 T Eric A. Ostrowidzki Banana-Rama-Shama (or, Political Bananas) (Yes, we have no bananas, We have no bananas today!) 1 They always come in unreal yellow Like the unbruised skin of a Chinese Courtesan in comic books. Each one is a structural marvel, A work of architectural perfection, As if designed by the pioneering genius of a corps of American engineers. They seem so polished, Though they are not stones, And rarely, if at all, They exhibit a brown spot Fading into appearance, A blemish of mortality, Not an unsightly liver-spot or cancerous mole, But the barest wisp of freckle, lightly dusted, And tinged with the eclipsed penumbra of dusky-red. 2 Their sweetness is a disgusting sham, A sugary ruse, For they conceal Within their pre-wrapped goodness The green bitterness of poverty, The bloated bellies of infants, The bloody suppression of peasants And the slaughter of justice, of morality, of innocence ... All that dearth and death! In thickly thrusting groves 25 Eric A. Ostrowidzki Eric A. Ostrowidzki Which bristle like a bunch of green-gloved fists Clenched as if to crush the latest Revolutionary Party, They appear like a judgment Over this fertile land parcelled out To the Banana Barons who hold a monopoly On this Bonanza of Bananas. 15 cents to the Banana Barons Who make all this deliciousness possible; 3 cents for me because of a store-sale; And 1 cent for the pickers and washers Who live in shanties like vagrants, beggars, and thieves. Yes, the exploitation of poor workers is "good for the economy." 3 They conceal more than we will ever know, Like the pungent spice of death Bereft of its keening odour and taste. I love to eat them, To slowly peel their Sun-warmed halcyon ripeness Like soft horns of carved ivory. I crave to touch them while They lie mounded in tempting heaps in green bins Like furless and plump golden-yellow bats, And sleeping like quiescent pods in supermarkets ... Then, when nobody is looking, I deftly Lick the invisible film of ecstasy Which sticks to the tips of my Guilty fingers. I cannot help myself. No. 5 I burp. I have a slight bit of indigestion. Hopefully, tonight, I will be well enough To sip my banana daiquiri Topped off with a big slice of banana-cream pie. I live for these small pleasures, My petty addictions, Which some have said have conquered The lands and lives of less fortunate souls. Yet I have earned the right to gorge myself, The right to consume the plunder of the world, An international cornucopia of Red-orange mangos, kiwis, coconuts, and those eversucculent guavas! If not me, then who else will profit by the losses of others? So beautiful in their broad glossy leaves, So abundant in their elongated, lobe-swollen, yellow crescents, They await to be plucked, To be baptized in sparkling sheen of purifying acids, And then trained and boated and trucked To market. Who will profit? I say. 4 I like my bananas doused in milk and sugar. I like them sliced on my morning cereal, Like mushy coins of fibrous fruit. I bought them at 39 cents per pound At the local Safeway Store. To whom do I pay for my breakfast, To whom do I owe an outstanding account? 8 cents to the Safeway store; 12 cents to the transporters and distributors; 26 6 Ecuador, Honduras, Guatemala .. . Dole, Delmonte, Chicquita .. . The game is the same, 27 Gerry William Eric A. Ostrowidzki Only the brand-names are different. What matters to me how these Long yellow loaves of honeyed manna come to Cheer my table in the morning? What care I for the lean brown bodies that Waste in green-dripping heat, So that I might savour The Glut of Paradise Like some Plantation-owner perspiring gently in white linen? Can we love whom we are not? Should we deny ourselves great plenitude Because of the barren poverty and pain of another? Should I blame myself For my insatiable and rapacious desire Which leads me to betray The ban of boycotts And to pursue the savagely selfish politics of consumption? Left for two, maybe three days at most, And already my bananas begin to rot As if by some powerful inner corruption. 28 Fever (an excerpt from "The Lake") On the second day of the hunting trip, the syilx rounded a bend of the mountain. The land was still save for the chirr of grasshoppers jumping from the path of the nine horses and their riders. The heat was constant, but it was also light, a reminder of the height above the valley. Horse knew the country well, and rode easily, letting his horse follow the lead of the riders ahead. Every so often Horse would tum to look behind. It was instinctual. He had to know the country they passed as well as the country they rode into. He also knew enough to watch for any signs of pursuit from either animals or from the Secwepmc, whose lands were very close. Horse also had his mind elsewhere. Last night, just before setting up camp, Horse had watched as Coyote, Sn-klip, sat on a mound half a bowshot from the riders. Sn-klip s boldness, always there, was different this time. He ignored the other riders and stared at Horse, their eyes meeting and locking. "What are you trying to tell me?" Horse asked. Sn-klip cocked his head to the left, his ears flapping forward. Another rider, seeing this, grinned. "I think Sn-klip likes you." Horse grinned back. "I guess he has good taste." This set up a round of humour which lasted until the headman chose a camping site. By the time Horse looked around, Sn-klip had faded into the low underbrush, his lingering yip the only mark of his presence. Sn-klip s bold stare was a message, this every syilx knew. The other riders also knew that the message was directed at Horse, and so left him to puzzle over what that message might be. The headman had spotted elk, and less than 29 Gerry William Gerry William an hour's ride ahead. Horse, being the last rider, paused at the bend. The steady low hoof beats of the horses ahead quickly became distant. Horse saw the distant blue ridges across the valley. Many days' ride away, some of the mountains glinted with streaks of white. Below where he sat the valley arced south, briefly hooked right and then faded straight south out of sight. The blue lake shimmered in the heat, its edges coloured a lighter blue where the water lapped ashore. The lake's surface was mottled with whitecaps, a contrast to the still warm air which hovered higher up the slopes. Horse kept seeing Sn-klip s mocking gaze. Something warned him and he turned to look back where he had come from. The shock of seeing Sn-klip so close without any warning from his mount startled Horse. Sn-klip was agam staring at Horse. "What are you telling me, old one?" Sn-klip was crouched on all fours, his head tilted forward and his long ears laid back in a posture Horse hadn't seen Sn-klip assume before. At the moment their eyes met once again, a wind from the south brought a quick chill to the air. The tree branches all around remained still while the gusts of air made Horse's mount nervous. Sn-klip was gone once more by the time Horse had regained control of his mount. Horse suddenly felt the air and sun spin around him, and he held onto his mount's mane while the dizziness first swept over him, through him, and then was gone as quickly as the return of the still air. **** On the fifth day the hunters returned from a successful hunt. The camp knew long before their arrival of their coming, and the hunting party was met well before they came within sight of the twenty lodges. While most of the hunters were 30 joyful in arriving, Horse was quiet. None of the other riders had felt the wind which blew through him, nor had the trees stirred. The headman told Horse he had had a vision, but couldn't explain Horse's being sick. "What you have seen and felt you must bring to our Elders. They will know what signs to read." Horse entered the teepee through the tulle mat cover. He accepted the fact that four Elders were waiting as though for him alone. He took a place near the fire, and thanked the Creator for his health and the health of the camp. Then he sat staring into the low flames until an Elder spoke from the opposite side of the fire. "It was a good hunt." Another Elder spoke. "The elk were large and swift, but not as swift as our young men." "Yes, our young men can run fast." The subdued laughter which followed trailed into the sounds of the firewood as it burnt, sending shadows jumping against the tulle mat walls. Although still daylight outside, it could have been any part of the day or night. Horse waited, his eyes glowing in the fire's light. "How is old Sn-klip?" Without looking away from the fire, Horse answered, "Sn-klip tried to tell me something." "Only you?" The voice, being low, could have come from any of the Elders. "Sn-klip looked at me twice from close up." "Aiyee. It is a sign, a dream." "The second time there was a wind. It came and went without warning, and I felt sick. Like I was both warm and cold at the same time." Another silence while someone threw another piece of wood into the flames. "We must move camp soon. Some of the families will go root and berry gathering, while others will travel south. The 31 Gerry William Gerry William fish are coming." "The signs are good. It will be a good year for our people." "Sn-klip talked with only Horse. Perhaps the message is only for him, not for our people." "We should think on this. Sn-klip s boldness means something. I will talk to our shaman, the tl'ekwelix. When we gather again I will have some answers." **** The fire came on the wind, twists of flames spiralling north like the breath of a forest fire. Red tongues consumed everything in their way. The syilx fled in groups, scattering towards safety, but the flames increased, lifting people from their feet and sending them into the sky to disappear within the walls of fire. Other syilx, panicked beyond all reason, dove into the river, only to be swept away both by water and fire. A black shape emerged from the sky. From its gaping mouth a tall woman strode towards Horse. She was one of them, a syilx, and yet so strange in her clothes of shimmering colours. She moved as the wind moved, a wave of motion and heat. Horse felt her coming like the coming of the first horse. The land shifted around the woman. Behind her loomed a floating object larger than the great peaks east of the valley. The woman bore the carriage and marks of a warrior, a scar running down her left cheek. "I welcome you to our land," Horse managed to greet the stranger. The woman smiled and a warmth flooded through Horse which had nothing to do with the tongues of flame which continued to consume syilx everywhere. "I have looked for you all my life," the woman bowed. "When I give to you, I give myself." "Good words. How may I help you?" 32 "I am your future. The future of your people. You cannot help me. I come into your dreams, as I must." "I understand. Can you help my people?" The woman turned to gaze at the devastation. For a long time she stood motionless, the winds of flame brushing against her blue shimmering clothes without touching her, or scorching the cloth. She only turned back to Horse as the screams faded into the distance. "Help isn't here. I cannot give you what you ask. But I am here as proof that we will continue." Horse stared at the great object which hung in the sky. "Is there anything I can give you?" The tall woman laughed. "Our people are dying around us, and you ask whether you can help me. No, you cannot help me. I bring you a simple message. The future will be yours when you own it." The woman faded then, as she strode back into the floating object. **** "I cannot say what this dream means." The tl'ekwelix nodded, his dark eyes unreadable as he leaned closer to the rocks and steam. The heat rolled around them, cleansing Horse's body but grating against something deep inside, a dark object which refused to move. The ti 'ekwelix turned at last to Horse. "I know this woman. She has appeared in my visions before, and in the visions of other Elders. We cannot say who she is. She has power, but that power cannot help us now. She is not from our times." Horse waited, his body a river of sweat running down the black rock of his resistance. The tl 'ekwelix threw another ladle of water onto the burning rocks, and a cloud of vapour obscured them from each other. When the vapour became heat 33 Gerry William Gerry William and Horse could see the small wiry ti 'ekwelix, the shaman was again looking towards him. "We have been told of strange things coming our way. There are people whose skins are the colour of the clouds and more numerous than the grasshoppers along the hillsides. Our brothers down south tell of empty villages and bodies floating down rivers. Spirits roam this land now, angry spirits, strange spirits. In the last moon one of our villages has disappeared. The syilx who found the village felt sadness as he came close, but something held him back from going in the village. He saw an untended campfire in the middle of the village, but there were no skahas, no dogs anywhere. Just ghosts which pushed through the empty village. Not even the cry of babies. It was the strangest feeling of the syilx 's life, and half of his head hair turned white from fear. He ran for two days, forgetting even his horse." "Aiyee. Are we then to die without a fight?" "We cannot fight ghosts, spirits. They are the land itself. They are the woman of your dreams, something not here. Something which we cannot touch." **** It came in the first cough. The young hunter had returned from a trip to a village southeast of the valley. Over the last day of travel he felt light-headed, and he moved as if he waded through water. A pleasant lethargy filled his body, and his hands turned red from warmth. By the time he reached his village, his hands contained a rash which he scratched, unable to help himself. He took to his tulle mats as soon as he arrived, and it was there that he coughed for the first time. His woman daubed his face as the fever took hold. The tl'ekwelix whom she brought in to look at her man used bitterroot medicine to soak the young man's body. When the fever raged on, and red spots which turned into pustules 34 began to dot the man's face, the tl'ekwelix tried to get the syilx to drink a bitter tea, but the fever and cough continued. On the third day the ti 'ekwelix was exhausted, and the woman was near hysterics, her weeping filling the teepee and the surrounding area, where a good number of syilx hovered, both in support for the young couple, and puzzled by the young man's fever and outbreaks, none of which anyone had seen in their lives. The death rattle came when the ti'ekwelix left the teepee for more medicine, leaving the feverish man and his exhausted woman alone. She was sleeping but the ti'ekwelix 's motions as he left stirred her from her sleep gradually. A strange sound woke her, a sound which sent chills through her skin. In the low firelight she could barely see her man wrapped in blankets. The moan came from the wind, or so she thought at first. But the rattle from across the fire, and the way her man's body seemed to heave into an impossible arc, made the young woman sit up. Fearful as she was of the figure which seemed to bend almost in half, the woman overcame her fear and screamed for help as she scrambled towards her man. She heard an awful pop as though he had broken his back, and then, as others raced into the teepee, they watched as his throat rattled in a gurgle. It was like watching a twig unbend. As he breathed out, his body slowly flattened until he was once more stretched out on the mat. The gathering of family and friends was enlarged by those who had heard of the man's strange death, and had come to support the village in its grief. **** Horse rode down the gentle slope towards the village. He had followed the ti'ekwelix 's words, and spent the last twelve suns alone beneath a waterfall where he regularly bathed between sweats He was eager to be with his family. 35 Jane lnyallie Gerry William The strange woman had appeared to him the previous night and urged him in soft tones to return home. Horse's mind was on the woman of his dreams and he almost didn't notice the body in the stream until his mount shied away from the water. Startled, Horse left the woman's words to find himself staring at the body which lay face down in the stream, its arms and legs moving as though the boy were swimming. Horse didn't immediately do anything, respectively waiting for the boy to stand up or to move. When neither happened, Horse felt the hair on his arms raise up in the warm air. Smoke spiralled up through the trees. Horse knew something was not right, and five minutes later he rode into camp. The first thing he noticed in the distance were the blankets, They were strewn throughout the camp and among the pine trees along the ridge. Horse dismounted and let his cayuse go. A cool breeze stirred the leaves, some of which fell into the smoldering ashes to create small bonfires which briefly flamed and then subsided. Horse limped to the nearest pile of blankets, and noticed the acrid smell of death as he drew closer. Beneath the blankets lay Wolverine, his eyes endlessly staring into the overcast sky. His face was ravaged by marks which Horse had heard the fur traders call small-pox. Horse felt his feet leave the ground, floating as though afraid to touch Toom-Tem, Mother Earth. He forced himself to gather some foliage. Leaning over Wolverine, he closed the mystic's sightless eyes, letting go of his own grief with the song which took Wolverine into the world where Coyote waited for his children. East of the camp the river flowed over more bodies, also naked as women, children, old men and warriors had stripped their clothes off in a final frenzy to cool the bonfires which burned their souls crisp. Time changes everything but memories, and the leaving of the Canada Geese, the falling of the leaves will be with the Okanagans forever. 36 Belinda The Biker Belinda The Biker lived next door. When she moved in, it was the third world war. Her stereo blasted, shaking the walls. The smell of leather hung in the halls. People visited all through the night. Very little movement in broad daylight. The landlord was summoned early one morning. "Too much noise; this is your warning!" Doors were slammed, walls were knocked. Down to the floor crashed my good wall clock. "You have to pay!" The landlord did say. Not long after, under cover of day. Belinda and crew stole away. On my wall, there is a bare spot. Belinda The Biker still owes me a clock. 37 Jane Inyallie ironhorse they called him ironhorse the child who became a renegade he never stayed in one place made friends wherever he went and travelled far beyond anyone he knew would dare he had a look in his eye kinda lost kinda sad Jane Jnyallie he left for a long time called now and then over the years one day he showed up unexpectedly he said home's a good place to rest not long after ironhorse left again now he travels among the stars for Brian i said i know you like the taste of drink are you going to settle down one day? not to worry he said i 'm a solitary guy i know where i 'm going and i do as i please mother, he said she's messin' with my mind 38 39 Jane Jnyallie Jane lnyallie the forgotten son I the forgotten son stands alone in a crowd of youth he searches the faces of those around him looking for something that lies beyond his reach he fades into arcades pool halls all night bars and corner cafes the street becomes the only home he knows or wants he fights anyone or anything that stands in his way he boozes drugs 40 and smokes until nothing satisfies his appetite not even the SM girls who knowingly travel the night he roams the streets and avenues snarling yelling and screeches down alleys into the night II the forgotten son is older now he's tired of the highs and the lows there's no more excitement in the fight he no longer looks at the faces of those around him he looks at his reflection and sees where 41 Jane Inyallie he's been and he knows where he's going tears run down his stubbled cheeks when he realizes he IS his father's son Jane lnyallie the line most ofus know when we've crossed the line and we don't know what it's like until we've crossed it if you can see the line it's easier to get back the further away you go the harder it is to get back when you can't see the line anymore you start to forget it's there 42 43 Gordon Bird Gordon Bird Terminal Frost 1. Terminal Frost 2. puck on ice floating in the dead sea first winter in Ontario first time playing hockey on ice five Native people decide to float in the dead sea to hang out and sunbathe an absolutely beautiful day to float to float bunch of local boys on a frozen pond hack the puck around out of bounds over the snowbank to get it foot goes through the ice all the way up to my knee water so cold quickly pulled out my foot told them about the thin ice just laughed at me found it funny laughed along with them slapped that puck around on the ice found a good spot to put our blankets head down to the water's edge gaze over the water awe-struck on the other side of the lake of salt is the country of Jordan it felt like we were in heaven oh in heaven awesome sight of the landscape smell of salty air forever etched into our memories stepped the rest of the way into the dead sea amazed at how one floats with such ease exerting no energy enjoying the clear blue sky a mud bath that covers the entire body dark clay mud baked on the skin by the sun back to the lake to wash it off (glorious) feeling refreshed, revitalized clean life energy five native people said good bye to the dead sea 44 45 Gordon Bird Gordon Bird Terminal Frost 3. Terminal Frost 4. young boy swimmer alone with myself young boy swimmer swims at jone's beach for about a hour isolated in this one spot out in the deep woods overcast weather on the day hadn't started to rain until an hour ago alone with myself young boy swimmer decides to swim to a friend's home just down the shore line a ways swims closer to the dock weeds the thick weeds twine and wrap themselves around young boy swimmer more he struggles more the weeds tighten around young limbs hysteria and panic strike young boy swimmer has no breath at that moment he is submerged under water looking up from under the water fights to free himself thoughts of dying terrify young boy swimmer message to "save yourself' was enough to save his own life weeds loosen enough release young boy swimmer 46 no place to live in a mental mess had my health at least alone with myself decided to run from myself to have my troubles disappear if only for a little while alone with myself thought about what I should do the song New Machine plays in my ears I have always been here I have always seen through these eyes alone with myself rain turned into a steady down fall stayed right where I was under the tree didn't want to leave this safe shelter alone with myself carved a cross of all things to do soothed and complimented this sad feeling alone with myself 47 Jack D. Forbes Jack D. Forbes New Age of Circuses High-minded romance, Selling instead our MINDS and our time Highest bidder gets them. Make us laugh Make us cry Make us forget that it's a World of Entertainment Sensory addictions Circuses Overwhelming even our homes Television's fungus-like Growth and we are grasped with Octopusian tentacles of desire. Because when we Surrender to being enter-tamed Addicts, we become slaves, Pimps to the Corporations, organizations, and Politicians who want to Crap into our Brain, into our Emotions, into our reflexes, into our Deepest private selves A stream of ice cream cones and Hot dogs and candy bars Apples it carries Laced with glass and strychnine, Mixed with snot and faeces Blood and guts, the Poisons of violence, brutality, Self-centered narcissism, Love of filthy lucre layering Sentimentality and just plain Sex. Good it all seems, Tsunami of Distractions, of education, of Armchair travel, of exploring Nature but its sheer volume Suffocating to the many Who cannot say no. Entertainment's world is not About goodness though, nor 48 Exposed to every Imaginable kind of torture, Murder, rape, watching Depraved behaviour even by our Heroes, the cops, the private Detectives who brutalize people And make us cheer and Feel it's normal with the Selling of sweatshop-made shoes by Millionaire hoopsters. I I I I I I Human beings being reduced to the Ugly banality of the consumer, Passively fighting Obesity, their loss of Authenticity in the couch-potato world Life's bystander or as a paying Customer in a work-out room Desperate to have a Physical existence. 49 Jack D. Forbes Immersed in a new Kind of corporate-fascism Without armies of black or Brown-shirted goons since Television and circus Pull us into an apolitical Maze where participation Means being bamboozled by Money's lies. Life for too many of us has become a Fantasy of pleasure which is Really pain, a myth of Being entertained, when we are Enslaved, really being hypnotized Until we die of old age, Lonely in our old people's home, still Watching TV images flicker before a Mind already dead! Un-ending entertainment is a Social sedative, a Narcotic worse than cocaine, Creation of inertial Indifference to all but the Shopping mall and the gladiator's Arena. Coliseum, mall, boob-tube, Symbols of a new autocracy, Demo-Rep one party state Money is the measure Of all, and where the celebrated are Mindless cretins, skinny narcissistic Models, and actors whose 50 T Jack D. Forbes Being is to imitate, Not to initiate. Rome the new has found that Circuses still work, Circuses and bread but bread Means now material Goods, and for that some will Steal others Will give up freedom for the Chance on the lottery of Life or the sudden plummeting into Depths of the under Class, to be forgotten and Despised in a world where Politics is only money Differently spent. To be entertained Great it sounds, doesn't it? But when they've got you Hooked by your Eye-balls, or by your ear-drums, Or by the boredom of an emptied life Ask yourself what has been lost. Could it be you? The you That might have been? 51 Jack D. Forbes Picasso's Fall Picasso it is told did not grow older and wiser like some Indian Elders lust and delusions of wealth travel with him spiralling downward his quest is not spiritual he loses the secret genms he once had obscured by vanity by jet-set unrealness He decays, it seems, like an old rich man Old men especially old rich men old famous men must be careful in chasing young women who is the hunter? motives are everything, 52 T I Jack D. Forbes and style ... The prick of materialism erect as it can be in old age hardened by self cravmg illusions of being numero uno must fail in the wreckage of discarded lovers beneath the feet of desire. Picasso grateful are we for the beauty for the lessons driven through you by the World of Spirit sad that you did not at the last grasp your own teaching But then in the end we learn from both your gemus and, finally, your humanity! 53 Jack D. Forbes Jack D. Forbes Women Made of Earth and Honey I think a lot about these maple-syrup coloured girls About mountain-honey nut-brown ladies About deep, dark molasses women About golden-brown-sugar girls About red-brown earth coloured ladies About rich smelling, soft-hard Mother Earth women Her same colours all browns and reds and blacks. Giving thanks to Our Creator for making so many kinds of women-folk different shades of brown and shapes and sizes smelling of sage and pine and wild grasses Just to satisfy my mind. Brown wood-toned women suffering strong surviving With little children around them bringing forth the generations Our lives passing through their bodies. I can't speak of all women but these women I know Indian Black Mexican and more 54 Bending under heavy loads but standing strong these last four hundred years going on still this day lasting and loving nurturing In calm fierceness making elbow-room for hope With soft flesh hard as steel. Native women thousands strong With beautiful hearts in old cars chugging kids piled high crowded homes and migrant camps no money Helping kinfolk nursing men and children beaten-down Warriors and mothers hard and soft strong and gentle singing and laughing with sidelong glances at constant pain. We shall sing a song for these women the Mockingbird does the Meadowlark and wild canary the wind and I to caress honour and respect Our hard as iron soft as rabbit's fur women-folk Caught in a storm they gather the children around them keep us all warm. 55 Jack D. Forbes Jack D. Forbes It don't matter where I go like their sisters earth-coloured strong mean and mellow calling ancient spirits with hoodoo eyes un-named candomble. there's something about these Earth-Coloured women Special I mean is it the eyes the way they look at you? They like men Even blind no matter how bad we treat them still liking us ready to try after every disappointment to take us in again bits of themselves given freely If we give something back they grow stronger And so do we. Something special I tell you about these Indian girls dancing proud singing high nasal style holding babies in their arms natural noble ladies dignified shy and bold unafraid self-confident standing tall Unless we men help to saw them down. one can see these our earth-coloured women desecrated denigrated denied defamed Taught to boogie away the pain 'suited and 'slaved to whoring boozed and abused Still with style but all the while being destroyed like jewels ground up making dust storms coating men's lungs with asbestos fibres of finely-shattered obsidian and jade Bits of women that coughing cannot spit out shame and tears. And Red-Black girls Mother America Mother Africa thrust together by slaver's boats and raiders' guns making powerful trans-oceanic magic from Brazil to Massachusetts Natural unaffected un-sophistry-cated girls from down the country roads old ways in them still Around us And Black girls of many tribes and roots forged together anvil-hardened 56 making wholeness mus curing healing 57 Jack D. Forbes Jack D. Forbes with magic of honey and herbs Medicine-women passing on powers soul to soul a hand on your arm or touching your hair a song a smile. Looking into your own being Your own mirror You see a true reflectionHow beautiful you really are! Oppressor's mirrors like fun-house glass only distorts and warpsdo not look there for images! Tough at twelve With the mirror of my gut and being exaltation you will see Exalting high these brown and black girls putting them elevated on a sacred hill giving them regal titles for all of the contests they've won though no one wanted them to enter but kept out they still win hands-down anyway. women at sixteen girls still at fifty Carrying us all on their backs laughing and easy while serious and stubborn Loving love moving in unison with their bodies unashamed of female natures juicy and sweet, not dry and sour deep feelings nurtured, not crushed many-dimensioned women, not cold and calculating minds Sharing the universal pain dancing the dance that leads to our healing. Third World women-folk growing up in the back of a fast-moving pick-up truck out in the rain all wet and cold, hungry still with love to give calm with a song they nurture rebound findjoy where others find only misery and self-pity. Undulating sensuous bodies restrained two-step forms Dancing to different music but dancing still Dancing right on through these four hundred years these twenty generations of hostile glances hateful looks crocodile smiles rocks and guns "So sorry, we just hired someone" "So sorry, we just rented our last apartmentjust forgot about the sign" of a scowl mouth smiling. 58 Surely you have won every reward a man 59 Rosemary White Shield Jack D. Forbes can give. Burying My Mother of Changing Woman of Kwan-Yin of Isis ofOxum of White Buffalo-Calf Woman Death sits on my doorstep Knows me Passes a greeting My heart does not understand. Daughters of Yemanha Your browness is a visible sign of the sweet honey and enduring earth from which You have been formed and of your nature, which is Sacred. Death sits on the edge Of the living, Peeling off the skin Of the wind, Until it sounds hollow, Emptied of its shells. Hollow like the swift air Rushing through The veins of the Badlands At night when the ancient voices Rise against human ears. It remembers the veins of the day too, Emptying them Off their bloodSilent veins of days Lying on the earthen floor, Rattling in the hollow wind, trembling Before the darkest sunrise. 60 61 ii Rosemary White Shield My Answer to the Professor Who Said I Should Write More Like a Man to Be Any Good When I write I can breathe out dreams inside my skin. They flow out of my lips like sounds of love on the tongue disappearing into thin air Rosemary White Shield On Trying to Make Chit Chat at Dinner Tell me, he says of your heart's desire I will give it to you. I want what you cannot give me I say. How do I explain home? appearing again on the paper, delicately arranged flowers slowly coming into view at the first hint of my sunrise. The home I find in slits, cracks, slivers of light between the teeth of the day Touching the new light of day. Softly moving through the lines of our doors we keep so closed. where God meets me walks my inner earth listens to my stones inside me touches those small rock creviced places, As if we could stop creation of all these things in our lives instead of painting their voices their words, under our blood, listening to their smoky whispers caressing our bones, dancing with all their powers in the open sky. turning my heart into a blazing red sun burning the sky burning the world burning into eternity. 62 63 Rosemary White Shield t Rosemary White Shield Zuya Wiyan Nagi Zuya Mani I grow old in the dark Ancient, like the spiralling winds On Hambleceya I am home here, in the place Where the spirits bring the new day, The small circle of blazing fire Calling In the darkness Of a hollow room Standing in the sun Against city traffic Against people running The wrong way Saying the Earth is flat, I see those haunting eyes Within me my demon Does not whisper my name He roars Tearing my heart Into shredded meat Before dawn. Us to live, to place our lips On the curved brightness With all the passion Of each everlasting breath, Calling us to touch The bones of God, To touch the fingertips Of Tunkasila. I am lost, unable to walk Tired of knowing darkness in the trees Facing yellow eyes. This moment I am aloneIt helps to have company When you sit in black nests. To see what your own Demons have to teach you. I long for the unseen To go into the Hills of the Forgotten Watch the prairie flow beneath my eyes. Only people make me lonely. I I I I I I I I 64 1 The problem is You must meet them, speak Their language Or the language of God; They know both. But the tongue You use must be your own. You must choose To sit with yellow pain When no one else notices 65 James Colbert Rosemary White Shield Too busy they are Falling off the edge of the Earth. Thrown Away I had become arrogant, Thinking my own demon battles Were victories, disappearing Into the summer sun, bent And faded like a warm sword. As soon as they had finished loading the trucks, the new staff sergeant yelled: "Flak jackets and helmets. Get 'em on. This is still Indian country." And although the heat was a suffocating presence, a humid oven, they put their five-pound helmets back on and their half-inch thick flak jackets, too. Joseph noted the muck on his boots, dried now and flaking like very old paint. He felt the sweat rolling off him. Earlier, he had smashed his thumb, and it hurt. All Joseph wanted-all any of them wanted-was to get on a truck and to get moving, to catch a little bit of breeze. The order came to saddle up, and they did, collecting their gear and scrambling onto the waiting deuce and a halfs, not talking much, too hot and too tired even for grab-ass. The more ambitious among them moved a few cases of the Crations they had loaded and made places to sit; the others just plopped down wherever they could. The short convoy turned east out of the compound, toward the larger road that would carry them north. As it happened, Joseph had jumped into the truck that had taken the lead-if it had been after dark, he would have been ordered into it, anyway, since the staff sergeant believed he could see in the dark. "I'm mixed-blood, not full-blood," Joseph had protested, not wanting more than his share of guard duty and time out on point. "Do the math, Private," the staff sergeant had countered. "If you see only half as good as a regular Indian, you can still see twice as good as these other guys." He made a gesture that took in the marines all around them. Joseph could not believe such stupidity. It was simply too ludicrous. Joseph had thought about putting in for a transfer-he had thought of other things, too-but had concluded that his time was so short that the most direct route was just to get through-the means to which altered then, too: And now, my demon hisses Asking me about metal, About sunlight, if I still see Beauty in all things. I answer the darkness does not own me Although I have come to know Its language, the names of its birds Flying in the silent wind Yet, God is near, And you are here to remind me Only That the Earth is round. 66 67 James Colbert Joseph had seen very clearly every single man in his squad busily looking away. For a few minutes they bumped along, sweat drying, thankful for the twenty-mile-per-hour breeze. Then, just before they turned onto the north-south road, the truck slowed to a crawl. One by one they stood up to see what was the matter. Most every one of them made a comment; every comment made was foul-mouthed. The ragged column of refugees stretched out of sight. The driver didn't bother to honk-there were just too many to move with a horn. They took up the whole road and then some. The lucky ones were packed into carts that ranged from primitive to prehistoric. An old woman rode in a makeshift farm wagon, an injured child on a crude sled. Most simply walked, their eyes dull and fixed straight ahead. Away to the north was the sound of an ongoing aerial bombardment. "Well," DJ said, taking out his well-honed Ka-Bar and slashing open a carton of C-rats, "we might as well make the best of it." He dug around until he found a can of cake and another of peaches; but no sooner had he put the cans on the roof of the cab and started to open them than kids began to appear. "Hey! Hey, GI Joe!" an older boy yelled, and banged against the side of the truck. "Hey!" "Hey what, you little fuck?" the squad leader snapped in reply. He was tall and lean with long, ropey muscles and a country boy's hands with big knuckles. If the boy saw the squad leader's M-16 swing in an arc that included him, he wasn't put off by it. DJ took out a pilfered mess-hall spoon and began to eat his cake and peaches, smacking his lips with obvious enjoyment. The squad leader slung his rifle across his back and tore at the case of C-rations DJ had cut open. He stood up with four olive-green cans, three in one hand and one in the other. He flipped the single can in the air, up and down, hefting it 68 James Colbert between the short tosses, weighing it. By now more kids had come; they walked beside the slow-moving truck, waving, shouting, holding their hands out for food. The truck stopped for a moment, the driver irritably sounded the horn, the kids pushed into a bunch, and the squad leader wound up and threw. The heavy can caught the boy over the eye, and he crumpled right where he stood, collapsing as if his strings had been cut all at once. The younger kids laughed and scrambled after the can as it ricocheted. Two smaller boys pushed a taller one forward as a shield. Others got so excited they tried to climb over each other's backs. The squad leader stretched his lips into a thin, hard expression, looked around at the men, then threw again. For a moment, no one in the truck moved. DJ even stopped eating. Joseph watched warily. Then, as if on signal, blades flashed, and very nearly every one of them tore into the cases of C-rations and the smaller boxes inside. They ripped out the cans and started throwing them, fruit cocktail, peaches, lima beans, meats of all sorts. The cans flew flat and hard. The kids who were hit solidly dropped like the first one, but the others kept coming even after their giggling and laughing stopped. Some limped from a hit in the leg; others cradled an arm or a hand. A young girl stood feeling her teeth-a second can missed her by inches. What impressed Joseph most was the calm and quiet, the orderliness of it. There were grunts of exertion as the men in the truck loosened up and threw harder. There were thuds and thumps and ugly, wet, soft-tissue sounds as the cans struck, but the children seemed afraid to make any sound and any sound they did make they muffled. Joseph didn't care to join in, but he didn't object to it, either-it just wasn't what he would call fun. Idly, he reached into an open case and pulled out a can, but, because he just sat there with it, it was grabbed from his hand. So he watched, and as he did so he wondered 69 James Colbert when his feelings about refugees had evolved to such passive indifference. It still irritated him that they so often got in the way. He still found them ·pathetic and resented the many problems they created. That they were outsiders in their own country should, it seemed to him, create some sympathy, but it didn't-not even when he recalled those hand-lettered signs in Oklahoma that read, "No Injuns"; not even when he replayed the conversation with the staff sergeant and caught the wink that had passed between him and his favourite corporal. The refugees had become all but invisible-his feelings for them as insubstantial as ghosts. Suddenly, a single shot cracked, and the men throwing froze; the kids still clamoured after the cans. Likely, it was all the time he had spent on point and on the perimeter at night, but Joseph had his rifle shouldered and sighted at the sound even before the whole sound had passed. There was a slight snick as he pushed off the safety. "Cut that silly shit out," the staff sergeant yelled angrily from the truck right behind them. Then he locked eyes with Joseph who was looking calmly at him down the barrel of his M-16 stubby. The staff sergeant's voice cracked just a little when he added, "We need those supplies for ourselves." The men in the truck sat down again, two or three looking a little sheepish. Joseph leaned back on a single, low C~ration case, knees higher than butt, arms over knees, rifle cradled snugly between hands and feet. He examined his thumb, which felt worse than it looked. His arms, he saw, were tanned. They had the same bronzed, coppery-red colour he had always admired on his grandfather, a colour on the old man unaffected by exposure to the sun. His grandfather was dead now, but, as always, it was that unique colour that Joseph thought of when he defined for himself the primary difference between the pure and the mixedblood, the colour and whether or not it had to be renewed by the sun, the colour and who walked and who rode the trails marked by tears, the colour that let him step across borders as if he could see in the dark. 70 Janet Rogers Magic Carpets Three in one Three in one Three in one She worked The rags Into braids That laid As carpet Beneath our feet One by one One by one She ripped by hand Colourful bands Sewn into one Her gifts Of love Bigger Bigger still A ball Of braid Would appear Like magic Attaching To canvas Thread knotted Fingers twisted Whistling while She worked Songs of The old country Covering, covering Cold floors Spreading, spreading She made more Multi-coloured Surfaces of braids Easing steps Her time She paid Braided flooring Telling stories Ofa Worker A woman A queen Her legacies Still cushion Our steps Though thin And old We have kept Her braids Another day She is done ... Three into one Three into one Three into one 71 Janet Rogers Janet Rogers No Reservation I know my brothers and sisters by the way we feel. The enemy can look similar, so trust your ancient instincts I am an Indian, without reservation Without memory of a land Where my ancestors lie sleeping My blood does not show traces Of the crops raised there And my accent does not say I am part of that tribe. There is an indescribable joy In returning to a land, meant for you by blood I embrace all that it is For this ... I have no reservation No, I was born and raised Away from them, away from there. Our sufferings, the same Our lessons, equal I look to them, who have remained Part of that territory And see a mirror image looking back I learn from them, and they from me I need their past to know me more A fresh breath is breathed into the language, the culture As I ask and inquire Of a way of life, in jeopardy of death No, my upbringing does not recall Kidnapping to institutions Of sadness of a language lost, I never had. And I share all the same The skin I walk in, and brown black eyes That house ancient secrets unrevealed even to me. '' :,; I An Indian is an Indian, is an Indian We are the true travellers of more than one world Your journey is my journey, and mine is yours This we share, in this granule of time 72 73 Kim Shuck Kim Shuck Because the Feet of Four Indian Women Might Change the Weather on the East Coast For any of the Indian kids I know who went off to Harvard and found it a cold place. Dancing on this slightly uneven ground, We circle with the fire always on our right. Our feet are the accurate feet Of southern style traditional dancers. We place them very carefully Each time we take Small steps To the music. We are pink and blue and green and dark brown. Our hair is braided And decorated According to individual equations. Nothing is left to chance. Some Things I Know About Love that Might be of Some Use 1. I cannot take a handful ofdirt from my backyard without seeing a woman. She has a crooked left eyetooth, solid hips and thighs And hair that reaches to her knees. When she tips her head back she can feel her hair Caressing her calves, the small of her back. I can see her gathering cress here Some four hundred years ago. I have to wonder with each handful of dirt What part of this dirt contains her hair? As I plant my squash I am grateful That she cares for me in this way. 2. I have heard the old women say We are connected by the Drum. The fringes on our shawls shift In exact patterns They describe the movement Of turbulent water or The stars. Our feet hold a message too. They say: We are proud Proud Proud Proud of you. 74 That the children look like the parent Who had the most fun making them. I wonder at the curl in my hair And my grandmother's story of the escaped slave Taken in And loved so intensely By her great-grandmother That the erotic aftershock Curls the hair of one member of the family Per generation Ever since. 75 Kim Shuck 3. Sometimes I see a flash of gold brown light In someone's eye. And I smell the flooded pecan grove Near grandma's house. I wonder if this is what it is for salmon Swimming upstream. Some small taste of the familiar That sets their sense of direction. And I think about my father With a shiver for the bravery Of trusting someone else's sense of direction. 4. Kim Shuck Home Songs 1. Always consider the possibility that you take yourself too seriously. 2. That dry cleaner is built On the most sacred spot In four counties. It was not intended as an act of irreverence. They didn't ask and we Were too embarrassed for them To say. Some things are more important than the time they take. 5. This scrubby grey mint Was snatched from death On a hot day near Petaluma. It rode in a wet tissue All the way to San Francisco. And despite only having had Half an inch of root It flourishes. Yeah, sometimes I get angry. Most often when I can't find any dirty laundry So I can go pray. 3. Just 'cause you don't know the stories, Doesn't mean there aren't any. 4. It's been ten years since I was home, but Jake doesn't even look up from the paper As I enter his store. "Your Gram is out of flour. You want tea you have to buy it. Milk's probably soured." 76 77 Kim Shuck I love you too old man. 5. Humour and food are the trickiest Of cultural artifacts, But overlaps do occur. My Polish and Tsalagi relatives Sat down one evening and enjoyed Potato pancakes together. And then there was the afternoon Of near delirium: 28 Elderly Indians Listening to Seuss in translation. 7 Larry Nicholson Residing Poem I 808 SPILLER ROAD S. E. (1997) up early cold cereal with Canada AM or cartoons the screen door slams, as the schoolyard awaits grey skies over stockyards down the street carry the stench of fermenting malt and slaughter two blocks away a train blares its approach but nobody wakes or hears anything out of the ordinary at the bus stop Jimmy the Lush lies fetal and waits for his ride to the tank, or heaven, whichever comes first and not that he'd know the difference I am the only Indian boy I know and invisible to old men with bulbous noses who hold up crumpled newspapers to hide the evidence of another failure, ragged and dishevelled men 78 79 Larry Nicholson Larry Nicholson trying to forget a lifetime on the sly the winds of change don't blow here, they just laugh and spread the smell II RESERVATION #341 (1990) imperceptibly, night descends over twilight as the rise and slope of this country meet somewhere beyond the dark blue and black calm, humid air hints of promise my senses are piqued by warm tea and the life teeming in the meadow behind this, my uncle's house, a breath of wind delivers the scent of horses and sweet blades bending there like the people who live here, fireflies hover and dart without pattern their bodies brilliant points of illumination promised land my name is nothing my age means less i come from all countries where there are no boundaries no judgements only clarity and stillness broken by a squeal of delight as she learns how to squeeze my hand t I, }.,, I: 1' from us come her first words old words with ancient meanings we search for those meanings unconcerned with success or failure l l 1 we accept our station without question or destination all places are young and the wind never blows cold in her mother's arms at times is all the beauty i can take sleeping well in the knowledge that we are safe i am home in other field, a young girl holding a jar snares one and watches as the fly struggles to breathe she walks away bored as light from the body fades then disappears 80 81 J Larry Nicholson Larry Nicholson Steal My Thunder coyote dreamz & rocks I listened as right before she hung up, she said "I love you, and don't ever come back." met her over there, eye suppoze? Damn! whut happind? That was my last quarter, too. said he dream' d abowt coyote and rocks cha. what kind of rocks? oh, the blue ones and red ones and maybee one night yell-oh he thinkx so now where is our neffew? bye the river ficksing a fireyou know he ses she's sen-say-shun-al! and she frah-lix like nobuddy's bizness, izzat right? and he alreddy lit the rocks the blue and red ones, prob'ly even the yellow 82 83 Leanne Flett Kruger Larry Nicholson betch it's got sumthing to