WEBVTT

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This next poem is in
the voice of salt.

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I taught for 22 years at the
Institute of American Indian

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Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

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And I probably worked
with native students

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from over 200 tribes
across the United States.

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So there's always a sort
of thread of Native culture

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that comes up at different
points in my poems.

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This is called "Salt Song."

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"Zunis make shrines on the
way to a lake where I emerge.

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And me walks gather me out
of pools along the Pacific.

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The cheetah thirsts for me.

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And when you sprinkle
me on ribeye,

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you have no idea how
I balance silence

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with thunder in crystal.

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You dream of butterfly
hunting in Madagascar,

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spelunking through caves echoing
with dripping stalactites.

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And you don't see how
I yearn to shimmer

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an orange aurora against flame.

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Look at me in your hand.

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In Egypt, I scrub the
bodies of kings and queens.

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In Pakistan, I zigzag upward
through 26 miles of tunnels

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before drawing my first
breath in sunlight.

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If you heat a kiln to 2,380
degrees and scatter me inside,

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I vaporize and bond with clay.

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In this unseen moment of powder,
praise, because my pattern

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is out of his hands.

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And when I touch your
lips, you salivate.

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And when I dissolve on your
tongue, your hair rises,

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ozone unlocks.

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A single stroke of
lightning sizzles to Earth."

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