And this is one from--
that will be in the journal forthcoming.
And it started with just, you know, when you watch clouds,
and at first you start to see the dragons, or the ship,
or all the beautiful things.
But I've been back home, living there now for a full year,
and so the sky is so big there.
And so when you watch them, being home,
once you sit out there for a little bit,
you start to see different things.
You start to get a little bit deeper cloud watching.
"Betsy Ross needled hot stars to Mr Washington's bedspread--
they weren't hers to give.
So, when the cavalry came, we ate their horses.
Then, unfortunately, our bellies were filled with bullet holes.
Pack the suitcases with white cans of corned beef--
when we leave, our hunger will go with us,
following behind, a dog with ribs like a harp.
Blue gourds glow and rattle like a two-man band--
Hotchkiss on backup vocals and Gatling on drums.
The rhythm is set by our boys dancing the warpath--
the meth three-step.
Grandmothers dance their legs off--
who now will teach us to stand?
We carry dimming lamps like god cages-- they
help us to see that it is dark.
In the dark our hands pretend to pray but really make love.
Soon we'll give birth to fists--
they'll open up black eyes and split grins--
we'll all cry out.
History has chapped lips, unkissable lips--
he gave me a coral necklace that shines bright as a chokehold.
He gives and gives--
census names given to Mojave--
George and Martha Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Robin Hood,
Rip Van Winkle.
Loot bag ghosts float fatly in dark museum corners--
I see my grandfather's flutes and rabbit
sticks in their guts.
About the beautiful dresses emptied of breasts--
they were nothing compared to the emptied bodies.
Splintering cradle boards sing bone lullabies--
they hush the mention of half-breed babies buried
or left on riverbanks.
When you ask about officers who chased
our screaming women into the arrowweeds, they only hum.
A tongue will wrestle its mouth to death and lose--
language is a cemetery.
Tribal dentists light lab coat pyres in memoriam
of lost molars--
our cavities are larger than HUD houses.
Some Indians' wisdom teeth never stopped growing back in--
we were made to bite back--
until we learn to bite first."