This is giving a voice for the young people in Navajo country.
"Gish."
First in Navajo, then in English.
[SPEAKING NAVAJO]
"Fire poker."
"There, the fire poker lies still, my mother, my father.
There used to be fire.
There used to be water.
There used to be food.
There used to be sheepskin bedding.
My mother, my father.
The hard floor is killing me.
Hunger is killing me.
Thirst is killing me.
The cold is killing me.
My mother, my father.
There, the fire poker still lies.
Please pick it up again.
My mother, my father."
I just finished reading a book by--
I forget the name of the author.
But it's called, The Child Called "It"
and then The Lost Boy.
We have a lot of young people who need help.
And it's also true in Navajo country.
We do have a beautiful philosophy.
We do have beautiful ceremonies.
We do have beautiful country.
But we still have people, young people, who need help.
And sometimes, as a poet and as a writer,
I do need to speak up for the young people to give voice
to those who cannot voice their concerns.
This is very moving for me because I lost two brothers
to alcohol, killed in a car accident.
So I do what I need to do through my writing
to address these issues.
In these situations, we look back to history, back
to the times of our ancestors, when they faced danger
and exhibited great courage.
So the next poem is titled, "An Acceptance of a Certain Death."
"In the heat of Northern Arizona plateaus,
you glanced back over your shoulder,
taking one last look at hungry crows gliding down in spirals
to descend on the child we left behind,
under the shade of a sagebrush in the dry gully.
You choked on your dreams of raising healthy children.
You tasted the salt of your own tears.
Then you strided into the Western desert.
Know that somewhere in that empty vastness
is the father of your children, the laughter of your children
as you moved further West.
Sun Carrier glared.
Each day I travel, I will take a life with me.
Changing Woman heard.
I thought of you.
She started rubbing her body."
Every time I feel that I'm stuck or I'm frustrated or faced
with a struggle of some kind, I always think of my ancestors
and what they went through, and the sacrifices they've
made, the choices they've made.
I can't imagine choosing to leave a child behind so that I
may survive and find those others who might still
be running around in the desert and raise them.
Those must have been tough decisions.
And I constantly ask myself, what kind of tough decisions
do I make today to ensure that the Navajo people will survive,
to ensure that the Navajo Nation becomes
a healthy and better nation?
I think it would be very easy for me to leave the reservation
and make a decent living, in terms
of what the Western culture would consider successful.
But I choose to remain on the reservation.
I choose to continue to write, to continue
to write in Navajo, because I believe that's where I belong.