I'm still waiting.
[LAUGHTER]
So this is a poem that--
there's two poems that I always have to read,
or somebody who knows my work will come and say,
how come you didn't read that?
I came just so I could hear that poem.
So this is one of them, this is called "Raisin Eyes."
I saw my friend Ella with the tall cowboy at the store
the other day in Shiprock.
Later, I ask her, who's that guy, anyway?
Oh Luci, she said, (I knew what was coming).
It's terrible.
He lives with me and my money and my car.
But just for a while.
He's in the AIRCA and rodeos a lot.
And I still work.
This rodeo business is getting to me, you know,
and I'm going to leave him, because I
think all of this I'm doing now will pay off better somewhere
else.
But I just stay with him, and it's hard, because he just
smiles that way, you know.
And then I end up paying entry fees
and putting shiny Tony Lamas on layaway again.
It's not hard, but he doesn't know when I'll leave him.
And I'll drive across the flat desert
from red valley in blue morning light, straight to Shiprock
so easily.
And anyway, my car is already used
to humming a mourning song with Gary Stewart complaining again
of aching and breaking down and out love affairs.
These Navajo Cowboys with raisin eyes and pointed boots
are just bad news.
But it's so hard to remember that all the time,
she said with a little laugh.
[LAUGHTER]