I'll finish with another basketball one, actually.
The top-- people love to make lists, right, so.
"Top Ten Reasons why Indians are Good at Basketball."
"1.
The same reason we are good in bed.
2.--"
[LAUGHTER]
Everyone likes that one.
At about 11 o'clock tonight, some of you natives in here
are going to be remembering that one.
Retelling it-- you ever hear that one?
"2.
Because a long time ago, Creator gave us a choice.
You can write like an Indian god,
or you can have a jump shot sweeter than a 44-ounce can
of commodity grape juice--
one or the other.
Everyone but Sherman Alexie chose the jump shot."
[LAUGHTER]
"3.
We know how to block shots, how to stuff them down your throat,
because when you say, "Shoot," we
hear howitzer and Hotchkiss and Springfield Model 1873.
4.
When Indian ballers sweat, we emit a perfume
of tortillas and Pine Sol floor cleaner
that works like a potion to disorient our opponents
and make them forget their plays."
[LAUGHTER]
"5.
We grew up knowing that there is no difference
between a basketball court and church.
Really, the Nazarene's hold church
in the tribal gym on Sunday afternoons-- the choir belts
out "In the Sweet By and By" from the low block.
6.
When Walt Whitman wrote, "The half breed
straps on his light boots to compete in the race,"
he really meant that all Indian men over age 40
have a pair of vintage Air Jordan's in their closets
and believe they are still magic-enough to make
even the largest commod bod able to go coast to coast
and finish a layup."
[LAUGHTER]
"7.
Indians are not afraid to try sky hooks in real games,
even though no Indian has ever made
a sky hook, no Indian from a federally recognized tribe,
anyway.
But still, our shamelessness to attempt sky hooks
in warm-up strikes fear in our opponents,
thus giving us a mental edge.
8.
On the court is the one place we will never be hungry--
that net is an emptiness we can fill up all day long.
9.
We pretend we are playing every game for a Pendleton blanket,
and the MVP gets a Mashantucket Peqot-sized per capita check."
[LAUGHTER]
Because the one from Gila River is tiny.
Right, this is-- everyone's like, yep,
got to marry someone from Foxwoods.
"10.
Really, though, all Indians are good at basketball
because a basketball has never been just a basketball-- it
has always been a full moon in this terminal darkness,
the one tail light in Jimmy Jack Tall Can's gray Granada
cutting along the back dirt roads on a beer run,
the Creator's heart that Coyote stole from the funeral pyre
cursing him to walk alone through every coral dusk.
It has always been a fat gourd we sing to,
the left breast of a Mojave woman three Budweisers
into Saturday night.
It will always be a slick, bright bullet
we can sling from the 3-point arc
with 5 seconds left on a clock in the year 1492,
and as it rips down through the net,
our enemies will fall to their wounded knees, with torn ACLs."
Thank you guys so much for listening.